GEORGE   MEEK 
BATH  CHAIR-MAN 


GEORGE    MEEK 

BATH   CHAIR-MAN 

BY  HIMSELF 

WITH  AN  INTRODUCTION 

BY 

H.   G.   WELLS 


NEW  YORK 

E; P  *  DUTTON  &>  COMPANY 
31  West  Twenty-Third  Street 

1910 


COPYRIGHT,  1910 

BY 

E.  P.  BUTTON  &  COMPANY 


SONG  OF  THE  CHAIR-MEN 

WE  do  not  live,  we  only  starve  and  linger  ; 

We  do  not  hope,  we  only  drift  along  ; 
We  have  no  faith,  the  years  have  made  us  faith-less  ; 

Come  !  listen  to  the  chair-men's  feeble  song. 

We  have  no  grip  on  life  all  things  pervading, 
We  have  no  cheer  but  what  to-day  may  bring  ; 

There  is  no  love  for  those  who  walk  in  darkness, 
O  !  listen  while  the  trailing  chair-men  sing. 

God  send  us  help,  or  else  there  is  no  saviour  ; 

God  send  us  hope,  or  else  we  die  in  pain; 
God  send  us  light,  or  else  we  blindly  falter; 

God  send  us  quickly  back  to  sleep  again. 

Blindly  we  strive,  the  vultures  gather  round  us, 
Weakly  we  seek  to  arm  ourselves  and  stand  ; 

We  may  not  fly;  there  is  no  welcome  waiting 
For  such  as  us  in  all  this  teeming  land. 

We  would  be  men,  and  do  men's  work  untiring  ; 

We  would  be  free,  and  never  know  a  care  ; 
We  would  be  strong,  and  give  for  what  life  giveth, 

But  Hope  lies  wounded,  dying  everywhere. 

We  would  achieve,  would  quarry  stones  or  build  them  ; 

We  've  but  our  manhood  left  to  us  to  save. 
Oh  !    Land  of  England  !  is  there  none  to  help  us  ? 

Is  life  just  this — and  presently  the  grave? 

GEORGE  MEEK. 


FOREWORD 
TO    THE    AMERICAN    EDITION 

WITH  the  possible  exception  of  Atlantic  City,  the 
coast  towns  of  the  United  States  do  not  possess  a 
class  corresponding  to  the  English  bathchair-man ; 
and  even  between  the  Atlantic  City  chair-roller 
and  his  British  prototype  there  is  a  difference  far 
greater  than  that  of  mere  locality. 

To  any  observer  but  the  ignorant  or  the  senti- 
mentally optimistic  (possibly  a  subdivision  of  the 
same  species),  these  bathchair-men  of  the  English 
seaside  resorts,  with  their  bent  backs  and  lack- 
lustre eyes,  wearily  hauling  some  sour-faced  malade 
imaginaire  or  some  white-haired  physical  wreck 
along  the  sea-front — Parade  or  Esplanade,  as  the 
case  may  be — or  idling  passively  in  the  dingy 
chair-rank  as  they  wait  for  the  advent  of  a 
chance  customer,  present  food  for  sad  and  some- 
what threatening  reflection. 

First  and  foremost,  the  bathchair-man — any 
bathchair-man — is  a  self-confessed  failure.  No 
man  becomes  a  beast  of  traction  with  entire  will- 
ingness or  with  the  idea  of  making  that  state  a 
step  to  something  more  lofty.  You  see  no  young 
bathchair-men.  Bathchair  dragging  is  something 

vii 


viii  FOREWORD 

to  which  men  fall — not  from  which  they  rise;  for 
it  is  an  occupation  that  exercises  none  of  the 
distinctively  human  capacities,  affords  no  incen- 
tive to  hope,  no  scope  for  intelligence  and  no 
opportunity  for  responsibility.  There  is,  in  fact, 
nothing  in  the  work  that  an  animal  could  not  do 
and  do  better,  but — the  man  is  cheaper. 

Secondly,  and  perhaps  of  deeper  significance, 
is  the  fact  that  the  bathchair-man  by  his  very 
existence  convicts  society  itself  of  failure;  for  in 
what  well — or  even  sanely — ordered  community 
would  a  class  such  as  this  be  permitted  to  arise 
and  perpetuate  itself? 

Society  has  produced  the  bathchair-man.  Very 
well,  society  stands  responsible  for  him,  and 
will  have  to  find  out  what  to  do  with  him  as 
with  the  other  people  of  the  Abyss — and  that 
soon;  for  from  this  grey,  tattered  and  disrepu- 
table company  has  at  last  come  a  clear  and  in- 
telligible voice,  the  disinherited  have  found  a 
spokesman,  and  we  discover,  with  whatever 
surprise,  distaste  or  indignation  the  idea  may 
affect  us,  that,  after  all,  the  waste-product  of 
society  thinks  itself — as  much  as  the  very  best 
of  us — entitled  to  "life,  liberty  and  the  pursuit 
of  happiness";  and  not  only  that,  but  is  capable 
of  a  very  obvious  and  natural  hatred  and  resent- 
ment towards  the  people  or  institutions  who 
seem  to  stand  in  the  way  of  those  desirable  things. 


FOREWORD  ix 

Now,  what  of  this  man  who  has  found  within 
himself  the  will  and  the  equipment  to  tell  such  a 
story  as  there  is  in  this  volume? 

I  think  the  thing  that  will  strike  the  reader  first 
and  most  continuously  is  Mr.  Meek's  extraordinary 
inefficiency  in  all  the  practical  activities  of  life. 

Handicapped  by  partial  blindness  and  physical 
weakness,  a  limited  education,  a  disordered  and 
squalid  childhood,  lack  of  instruction  in  any  money- 
earning  employment,  his  life-story  as  here  revealed 
is  one  long  and  monotonously  regular  record  of  his 
dismissals  from  every  employment  which  he 
managed  to  secure. 

As  he  himself  pathetically  says  (Chapter  xvn), 
"always  someone  else  has  wanted  the  work  and 
edged  me  out  of  it" — which,  seeing  the  immense 
advantage  the  man  who  holds  the  job  naturally 
has  over  the  man  who  wants  it,  serves  as  a  lumin- 
ous, if  unintentional,  commentary  on  his  own  lack 
of  grip  and  capacity. 

As  baker's  errand-boy,  boot-black,  hop-picker, 
furniture  mover,  sawyer,  canvasser,  groom,  club 
waiter,  collector,  prospective  Baptist  preacher, 
and  socialist  organizer,  he  achieved  invariable 
failure,  and  had  in  every  case  to  retire  in  favour 
of  some  stronger  or  less  particular  competitor. 

And  yet — as  Mr.  H.  G.  Wells  points  out  so 
forcibly  in  his  Introduction — Mr.  Meek  is  obviously 
no  ordinary  man.  In  fact,  he  is  a  most  astonish- 
ing one  in  many  ways.  Having  no  occupation, 


x  FOREWORD 

no  vested  interests,  no  stake  in  the  country,  as 
one  might  say — to  worry  over,  nothing  attracts 
him  more  than  the  responsibilities  of  the  nation, 
and  he  becomes  an  ardent  politician.  Having 
only  a  bare  common-school  education  he  begs  and 
borrows  weighty  books,  and  takes  upon  himself 
to  criticize  Shakespeare,  fearlessly  asking  what 
on  earth  people  see  in  him  and  casually  alleging 
his  own  preference  for  Homer.  Housed  in  the 
lowest  slums,  in  an  insect-ridden  stratum  of 
society,  where  it  is  not  an  unusual  thing  for  the 
husband  to  send  his  wife  upon  the  streets  in  order  to 
subsist  idle  on  her  earnings,  he  yet  projects  a  work 
on  Ethics  and  confesses  to  an  avid  love  of  life. 

Truly,  this  is  an  incurable  idealist,  exhibiting  on 
every  page  of  a  narrative  of  sordid  and  abortive 
existence  the  magnificent  fact  that  hunger  and 
thirst  cannot  kill  hope,  and  that  even  despair  is  not 
strong  enough  to  silence  the  soul. 

An  amazing  man!  an  amazing  book!  In- 
domitable spiritual  courage  to  command  one's 
admiration  and  envy;  mean,  unclean  and  de- 
grading years  to  call  for  one's  pity  or  one 's  scorn, 
and,  throughout,  an  actuality,  an  absence  of  pose 
or  attempt  for  "atmosphere,"  and  an  almost 
inhuman  carelessness  in  the  writer  about  the 
verdict  of  the  reader.  Nothing  held  back,  nothing 
exaggerated  or  glorified,  no  plea  made,  no  moral 
drawn.  Simply  a  life  history  without  conventional 
reticences  and  without  conventional  vulgarities. 


FOREWORD  xi 

"Life  is  filthy  with  sentimental  lying,"  says 
Mr.  Wells,  and  here  in  this  book  at  any  rate  the 
humanist,  the  philanthropist,  the  sociologist,  or 
the  mere  inquisitive  "man  in  the  street"  may 
see,  as  under  a  microscope,  the  heart,  mind  and 
soul  of  a  human  being — a  life  lived  according  to 
necessity,  without  concession  to  the  ideals  of  the 
Sunday-school  superintendent  or  to  the  theories 
of  the  sentimental  Utopian. 

The  truth  of  the  story,  its  simplicity,  are,  re- 
spectively, its  excuse  for  being  and  its  claim  to 
greatness. 

Now,  it  may  well  be  asked  what  has  America  to 
do  with  Mr.  Meek,  or  Mr.  Meek  with  America? 

The  answer  to  such  a  question  is  not  very  far  to 
seek. 

Meek  and  his  fellows  are  products  of  European 
civilization.  American  life  itself  is  a  child  of  that 
same  civilization,  and  the  weakness  and  diseases 
of  a  parent  have  a  most  unpleasant  tendency  to 
reappear  in  the  offspring. 

If  England  produces  these  socially  incompetent 
Meeks  in  hundreds  now,  America  will  be  produc- 
ing them  in  thousands  later,  when  the  private 
ownership  of  natural  resources,  together  with  the 
prescriptive  evolution  of  social  and  financial  in- 
equalities in  a  more  congested  society,  shall  have 
brought  about  in  this  country  conditions  com- 
parable with  those  of  the  present  day  in  Europe. 

Men  who  are  incapable  yet  thoughtful,  destitute 


xii  FOREWORD 

but  not  degraded,  men  who  have  nothing  to  lose 
and  everything  to  gain  by  the  overturn  of  existing 
conditions,  these  men  are  a  menace  to  any  and 
every  form  of  social  organization. 

This  book  shows  how  Meeks  are  bred;  and — 
since  knowing  the  cause  of  a  disease  is  half-way 
to  discovering  its  cure — it  should  go  far  towards 
suggesting  how  the  breeding  of  them  may  be 
avoided. 

And,  if  this  book  contains  a  lesson  for  America, 
it  may  contain  also  an  inspiration. 

Apart  from  the  example  of  splendid  and  per- 
sistent moral  courage  which  it  affords,  there  can 
be  clearly  realized,  from  the  references  scattered 
throughout  its  pages,  the  ideal  which,  a  quarter  of 
a  century  ago,  the  Union  offered  to  the  poor  of 
Europe. 

A  land  of  peace  and  plenty,  a  kindly  country 
in  which  the  man  who  had  failed  could  get  yet 
one  more  chance,  and  where  he  who  was  willing 
to  work  would  not  see  his  children  lacking  bread, 
nor  his  wife  without  a  roof  to  cover  her :  this  was 
what  America  stood  for. 

How  far  this  conception  of  the  United  States 
was  then  justified  in  fact,  or  to  what  extent  such  an 
idea  of  the  country  prevails  over-seas  to-day,  would 
doubtless  be  matters  difficult  of  precise  statement ; 
but  it  seems  to  me  that  a  people  can  easily  earn 
a  more  undesirable  reputation  than  this,  and  that 
to  be  regarded  as  the  natural  refuge  of  the  hungry 


FOREWORD  xiii 

and  oppressed,  as  the  land  of  opportunity  and 
the  cradle  of  the  future,  is  far  from  being  the 
lowest  or  least  noble  destiny  to  which  a  nation 
can  be  called. 

At  any  rate,  if  America  is  to  fulfil  this  ideal, 
there  is  no  doubt  that  she  must  discover  what  is 
to  be  done  to  prevent  arising  here  also  that  haunt- 
ing, that  persistent,  that  abominably  ominous 
question,  "  What  are  we  to  do  with  our  Meeks?" 

MOREBY  ACKLOM. 


INTRODUCTION 

THERE  are  people  who  will  not  like  this  book, 
just  as  there  are  people  who  will  not  like  its 
writer.  As  the  little  boys  say,  "Let  'em!"  I 
am  a  Meek-ite,  and  know  there  will  soon  be  other 
Meek-ites  in  the  world.  For  them  the  book  is 
published.  Mr.  Meek  is  at  once  a  very  typical 
and  a  very  extraordinary  man;  he  stands  for 
an  immense  class  in  the  modern  community,  and 
he  is  extraordinary  in  being  able  to  reveal  almost 
everything  he  stands  for.  The  reader  of  books 
who  is  also  a  lover  of  life  will  know  what  I  mean. 
Many  thousands  of  men  now-a-days,  in  every  class, 
trail  pens  and  leave  a  thread  of  ink  behind  them, 
but  it  is  only  here  and  there  that  that  trail  gathers 
itself  together  and  lives.  Mr.  Meek  does  all  sorts 
of  dreadful  things  at  times  with  that  pen — there 
are  pages  in  this  book  where  he  will  shock 
even  the  despicable  grammarian — but  he  writes. 
Reality  is  here,  told  with  a  frankness  that  marks 
the  elect.  There  are  no  vulgarities  of  the  would- 
be  tactful  or  would-be  genteel,  and  amazingly 
few  affectations  about  Mr.  Meek.  Considering 

XV 


xvi  INTRODUCTION 

all  his  circumstances  this  is,  I  think,  amazing. 
There  is  at  moments,  beyond  all  question,  the 
stark  simplicity  of  literary  greatness  about  him. 
A  year  ago — it  is  with  real  pride  I  add  at  my 
suggestion — he  set  himself  to  put  himself  upon 
paper,  and  here  he  is — self-portrayed  with  quite 
remarkable  success. 

I  first  made  Mr.  Meek's  acquaintance  through 
the  post.  I  do  not  distinctly  remember  when  he 
emerged  from  that  welter  of  generally  trouble- 
some correspondence  with  strangers  that  is  an 
unavoidable  part  of  an  author's  life.  But  I 
remember  I  had  marked  him  as  a  rather  queer 
and  interesting  correspondent  before  I  realized 
just  what  his  position  in  the  world  might  be. 
I  involved  myself  some  years  ago  in  the  internal 
politics  of  the  Socialist  movement,  and  it  was  in 
a  sort  of  loose  connection  with  this  that  he  had 
his  beginnings.  He  burned  with  a  passion  for 
"Socialist  Unity" — a  thing  as  probable  in  this 
world  as  theological  unanimity — and  then  I  fancy 
he  became  personal  and  self-explanatory.  I  re- 
member very  distinctly  that  he  produced  literary 
projects — of  an  utterly  impossible  sort.  There 
was  to  be  a  book  on  Ethics,  that  difficult  sub- 
ject, and  a  romantic  story  of  scientific  progress. 
I  was  no  doubt  discouraging,  but  whether  civilly 
or  not  I  have  now  no  means  of  ascertaining; 
usually  I  am  uncivil  when  I  find  people  who 
evidently  have  no  special  scientific  or  sociological 


INTRODUCTION  xvii 

knowledge  propose  such  undertakings,  under- 
takings simple  enough  in  their  way,  but  still 
demanding  at  least  that  much  equipment.  And 
perhaps  it  was  then  that  I  said:  "Why,  instead 
of  writing  about  things  upon  which  you  are 
necessarily  ignorant,  don't  you  realize  that  the 
only  thing  anybody  has  any  right  to  produce 
books  about  is  a  personal  vision  of  life?  You 
must  know  no  end  of  things,  and  have  felt  no 
end  of  things  I,  as  a  writer,  would  give  my  left 
hand  for.  Try  and  set  them  down." 

That  was  a  request  I  repeated  much  more 
urgently  after  I  had  met  Mr.  Meek.  He  came 
to  me  in  the  sunshine  at  bank-holiday  time, 
and  I  did  not  see  him  so  closely  as  I  would  have 
liked,  because  by  some  accident  another  visitor, 
also  claiming  attention  strongly,  happened  to 
coincide  with  his  call.  Mr.  Meek  is  so  frank  an 
artist,  he  has  all  the  shamelessness  of  the  wise, 
that  I  will  not  hesitate  to  tell  him  that  his  appear- 
ance shocked  and  interested  me  profoundly.  He 
was  dressed  in  ill-fitting  black  clothes,  very- 
dusty  with  the  journey  he  had  made  that  day, 
he  was  awkward  in  his  movements,  and  there  is 
something  in  his  eyes — I  do  not  know  what  a 
specialist  would  call  it — a  discolouration  of  the 
whites  and  a  peculiarity  of  shape  that  suggests 
the  eye  of  the  blind.  One  eye,  I  learn  from  this 
book,  for  the  first  time,  is  blind.  He  peers, 
walks  ill,  and  does  not  speak  very  distinctly. 


xviii  INTRODUCTION 

He  behaved  as  the  theoretical  gentleman  be- 
haves, and  as  no  conscious  gentleman  ever  did 
behave;  he  neither  cringed  nor  was  abashed, 
self-assertive  or  gross.  He  displayed  neither 
abjection  nor  conceit.  He  talked  simply,  as  for 
the  most  part  he  writes,  about  things  he  under- 
stood. He  was  very  full  of  "Socialist  Unity." 
You  will  find  in  his  twenty-seventh  chapter  an 
account  of  this  largely  pedestrian  tour  in  which 
he  visited  me.  It  is  the  record  of  the  obscurest 
of  men  engaged  in  the  oddest  futility,  and  at  the 
same  time  it  is  the  record  of  a  profoundly  touch- 
ing dream.  Think  of  the  figure  of  him  trudging 
along  the  road,  with  cyclists  and  motor-cars 
flying  by  in  the  bank-holiday  season's  rush 
for  pleasure.  Meek  went  to  Ashford  and  met 
quite  several  men  in  a  tiny  room.  He  tells 
how  good  they  were;  he  came  to  Folkestone, 
missing  the  two  or  three  Hythe  stalwarts;  he 
lunched  with  me  after  encountering  a  veteran 
of  the  Socialist  dawn  in  Folkestone,  and  so  went 
on  to  Dover,  where  he  also  found  a  small  knot 
of  men.  He  is  sympathetic  but  critical.  His 
mission,  I  say,  was  a  dream.  He  was  pleading 
to  the  miscellaneous  to  be  uniform  and  to  the 
inquiring  and  experimental  to  be  unanimous, 
in  order  that  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  might 
forthwith  arrive.  After  reading  this  book  you  will 
better  understand  his  impatience.  He  visited  us 
all  as  I  fancy  the  apostles  must  have  visited  the 


INTRODUCTION  xix 

germinating  churches,  with  clouds  of  glorious 
vision  in  his  mind.  What  did  all  the  weary  miles 
of  people  in  between  us  matter?  What  did  all 
the  institutions  and  traditions,  the  prosperity 
and  substance  that  made  up  the  world  about  us, 
signify  to  us?  Did  not  we,  living  in  the  light 
of  Marx,  know  the  hour  was  ripe  for  all  these 
things  to  pass?  They  would  presently  roll  back 
like  a  curtain,  and  show  the  stage  new-set  for  a 
universal  harmony  and  virtue  under  the  Worker's 
rule.  He  was  almost  serene  in  spite  of  his  fatigues. 
We  sat  in  my  garden  after  lunch  and  smoked  and 
looked  out  over  the  sunlit  sea  and  talked  of  the 
millennium.  (You  and  I,  Meek,  will  have  to  be 
dead  a  long  time  and  much  in  our  blood  and  our 
strain  dead  for  ever,  I  fear,  before  there  is  any 
millennium.)  At  last  he  declared  he  had  to  get 
on;  he  gave  me  a  peculiar,  mysterious  handgrip 
at  parting  (I  wonder  if  there  are  secret  societies 
all  unsuspect  beneath  respectable  feet  to-day), 
and  so  went  on  into  the  world,  a  dusty,  black, 
receding  figure,  full,  I  declare,  in  his  peculiar 
quality,  of  the  spirit  of  God. 

His  mission  came  to  nothing  tangible.  The 
reader  will  see  that  it  was  but  an  episode  in  his 
life.  Yet  it  was  no  passing  whim  that  set  him 
afoot  upon  the  roads,  but  a  dream  that  has 
touched  every  one  of  us  who  matters  now-a- 
days,  and  which  must  needs  become  more  and  more 
significant  in  human  lives  as  humanity  develops. 


xx  INTRODUCTION 

"Come,"  says  the  dream,  "this  earth  is  not 
good  enough  yet.  It  is  full  of  stupidities  and 
cruelties,  compulsions  and  hardships.  Up  and 
change  it,  change  as  much  of  it  as  your  strength 
permits."  Our  answers  are  absurdly  inadequate. 
Meek  goes  his  pilgrimage  through  Kent  and  a 
part  of  Sussex,  others  of  us  mumble  inaudible 
lectures  or  hesitate  valiant  opinions  through  a 
book  or  so.  Others  again  form  committees  and 
lose  their  heads  and  quarrel  with  their  colleagues. 
The  oddest,  most  questionable  offerings  lie  before 
the  altar  of  that  dream.  It  is  n't  so  much  a  tale 
of  widows'  mites  as  of  odd,  worn  stockings  honestly 
offered,  or  the  ribs  of  an  old  umbrella  proffered 
with  pride  and  devotion.  .  .  . 

But  my  business  now  is  not  with  the  dream  of 
Socialism  and  a  millennial  world,  but  with  the 
literary  value  of  Mr.  Meek.  So  far  as  this  book 
goes,  I  put  him  high  among  the  writers  of  our 
time.  But  then  I  am  a  heretic  in  these  things, 
rather  careless  of  style  and  elegance,  and  over- 
curious,  it  may  be,  about  life.  I  want  nothing 
so  much  as  to  know  how  people  feel,  to  get  to  the 
red  living  thing  beneath  what  they  have  learnt 
and  beneath  their  instinctive  defences.  I  hate  all 
idealization  and  all  the  concealments  of  idealiza- 
tion. Life  is  filthy  with  sentimental  lying.  I 
write  in  a  time  when  that  sincere  and  penetrating 
treatment  of  emotion  I  desire  is  fought  against 
and  suppressed,  when  the  artist  is  bidden  aban- 


INTRODUCTION  xxi 

don  his  attempts  to  mirror  life,  and  go  make 
beautiful  pasteboard  masks  for  the  vanity  of  dull- 
ness and  the  discretions  of  the  timid.  Every  man 
who  would  tell  of  reality  does  it  at  his  personal 
cost  amidst  a  chorus  of  abuse.  I  suppose  to  the 
very  end  of  things,  the  writer  who  matters  must 
take  as  his  endorsement  and  burthen  the  hysteri- 
cal cruelty  and  injustice  of  the  shocked  and  the 
virulently-inflicted  injuries  of  the  honestly  in- 
dignant. "In  other  words,"  as  Crumpher  used  to 
say,  I  have  my  doubts  if  the  new  censorship 
of  the  libraries,  which  is  to  do  so  great  a  work  in 
protecting  the  British  home  from  the  incon- 
venience of  ideas,  will  tolerate  Mr.  Meek.  No — 
there  is  that  lapse  into  gaiety  of  his  "Other 
Loves,"  and  "On  Going  to  the  Devil,"  and  the 
scandalous  defence  of  beer-drinking.  It  will  be 
too  much! 

It  is  interesting,  with  this  real  bathchair- 
man's  life  before  us,  to  speculate  about  the  sort 
of  bathchair-man's  autobiography  that  would 
be  tolerated.  It  would  be  written,  of  course, 
by  some  clever  woman  accustomed  to  district 
visiting.  Its  hero  must  have  none  of  the  pain- 
ful irregularities  of  origin  to  which  Mr.  Meek 
confesses,  and  his  appalling  cynicisms  about 
the  clergy  and  boys'  brigades  would  be  replaced 
by  a  manly  confidence  in  these  agencies  for 
good.  He  would  struggle  in  early  life  to  support 
his  widowed  mother,  and  the  physical  incapacities 


xxii  INTRODUCTION 

which  made  him  a  chair-propeller  would  be  caused 
in  an  heroic  effort  to  save  the  favourite  dog  of 
some  reader  of  the  Spectator  from  a  fire.     The 
chair  attained,  he  would  become  the  respectful 
admirer,  the  occasional  involuntary  eavesdropper 
of  its  occupants.     He  would  conceive  a  mute  and 
altogether    touching   adoration    for    a    beautiful 
invalid  girl,  his  customer,  which  would  flash  into 
generous    sympathy    when    her    handsome    and 
perfectly  correct  lover — kept  at  arm's  length,  alas! 
by  the  girl's  irrevocable  promise  made  carelessly 
to  a  maiden  aunt — appeared.    The  bulk  of  the 
book  would  develop  their  restrained  and  altogether 
commendable  passion — the  young  man  would  go 
away  to  a  war,  and  get  injured  in  some  manner 
consonant  with  the  dictates  of  good  taste — and 
the   closing   scenes  would  give  us  the  marriage, 
the  maiden  aunt  having  not  only  released  the  girl 
from  her  promise,   but  foreshadowed  a  legacy. 
Perhaps  even  the  story  might  go  on — for  there  is 
a  kind  of  boldness  possible  now-a-days  even  in 
desirable  novels  —  in  the  bathchair-man  saying 
that  only  yesterday  he  was  privileged  to  see  from 
a  respectful  distance  his  dear  young  lady's  baby — 
"and  a  beautiful  baby  it  was."     Such  a  book  is 
calculated  to  strengthen  the  mind  of  the  imperial 
citizen  and  intensify  understanding  between  class 
and  class. 

But  how   different   and   disorganizing  is   Mr. 
Meek!    He  not  only  declines  to  act  as  chorus  to 


INTRODUCTION-  xxiii 

his  customers,  but  he  is  almost  brutally  indiffer- 
ent to  their  important  concerns.  Instead,  he  tells 
of  concerns  of  his  own.  In  place  of  the  respectful 
sentimentalities  becoming  in  one  in  his  position, 
he  adventures  upon  squalid  eroticisms — as  Mr. 
St.  Loe  Strachey  might  say — on  his  own  private 
and  personal  account.  He  refuses  absolutely 
to  be  aware  of  those  admirable  Letters  to  a  Working 
Man,  at  once  manly  and  persuasive  in  tone, 
grammatical  in  construction,  and  interesting  in 
matter,  with  which  the  editor  of  the  Spectator 
wrought  little  short  of  a  revolution  in  proletarian 
thought.  So  far  as  Mr.  Meek's  incursion  into 
literary  and  sociological  criticism  goes,  such 
valuable  specimens  of  contemporary  mentality 
might  never  have  been  written.  His  attempts 
to  form  a  chair-man's  union  flew  in  the  face  of  the 
most  venerable  laws  of  political  economy,  and 
were — to  give  them  no  worse  a  condemnation — 
highly  disrespectful  to  everything  a  prosperous 
Englishman  holds  dear.  .  .  . 

I  do  but  jest  when  I  write  of  these  conspiracies 
of  moribund  minds  obliterating  Mr.  Meek.  He 
has  produced  a  living  work  that  will  defy  the 
embargo  of  Mr.  Mudie  and  all  the  libraries. 
How  living  it  is!  Could  anything  be  more 
touching  than  the  hunger  for  life,  and  the  zest 
in  life,  confessed  in  this  poor,  halting  body? 
Here  is  a  voice,  unmusical  perhaps,  and  half 
choked  by  the  grime  and  disorder  from  which 


xxiv  INTRODUCTION 

it  speaks,  yet  proclaiming  the  inexhaustible 
interest  of  existence.  It  is  impossible  to  read  the 
book  and  doubt  that  Mr.  Meek  has  found  life 
richly  worth  the  living.  In  that  acceptance,  and 
the  simplicity  that  arises  out  of  it,  lie  his  claim 
to  a  place  in  the  republic  of  literature.  He  soars 
above  the  common  herd  by  virtue  of  his  shame- 
lessness.  The  common  man  will  not  have  life  at 
any  price.  He  must  dress  it,  hide  it,  evade  it, 
stop  his  ears  to  it,  and  scream  and  shriek.  The 
common  man  humbugs  himself,  humbugs  every 
one,  goes  through  his  allotted  span  a  timidity 
and  a  pretence — to  fulfil  the  mysterious  purposes 
of  God  unknowingly.  But  Mr.  Meek  can  tell, 
unaffectedly  and  finely,  such  a  story  as  his  love 
for  Ruth,  or  that  cruel  moment  when  he  presents 
himself  before  his  American  cousin.  Those  two 
passages  took  me  by  the  throat.  I  want  no 
made-up  stories  while  I  can  read  things  like  that. 
He  has  no  vulgar  eagerness  to  forget  these  things. 
He  tells  his  bitter  humiliation — and  prevails  over 
it. 

His  style  seems  to  me  extraordinarily  clear  and 
simple;  he  has  a  curious  knack  of  giving  detail 
that  fixes  his  pictures.  If  he  lapses  into  such  a 
vulgarity  as  to  write  about  a  "number  nine 
smile,"  it 's  a  mere  momentary  slip  into  the 
dialect  of  his  habitual  reading.  Like  all  real 
living  things,  he  's  better  than  his  food.  .  .  . 

It  chanced  that  a  friend  of  Mr.  Meek's  re- 


INTRODUCTION  x*v 

ceived  the  MS.  as  he  packed  for  a  week-end  at 
a  great  country  house,  and  this  story  got  itself 
oddly  intercalated  with  the  talk  and  presence 
of  viceroys  and  ministers  and  great  ladies.  It 
was  a  queer  experience  to  finish  one's  dressing, 
tie  one's  tie,  adjust  the  fine  carnation  which  it 
is  the  pleasant  custom  of  that  house  to  impose, 
and  sit  down  very  bright  and  clean  in  a  chintz- 
covered  chair  before  the  fire  to  snatch  ten  minutes 
of  Meek  before  dinner.  It  set  a  curious  under- 
tone going  in  one's  thoughts.  One  talked  of 
this  and  that,  was  served  by  dexterous  butlers 
and  footmen,  admired  the  silver  and  flowers  of 
the  splendid  table,  and  there  in  the  shadows  was 
Meek — Meek  with  as  fine  an  appetite  as  any  of 
us,  as  capable,  for  all  his  want  of  training,  of 
as  subtle  appreciations,  Meek  like  a  frog  in  the 
dustbin.  Meek  hovered  all  next  day,  a  shimmer 
in  the  sunshine,  a  darkness  under  the  trees.  It 
was  impossible  to  avoid  comparison.  Meek 
would  have  made  a  very  passable,  and  perhaps 
quite  unusually  expressive,  peer.  I  think  he  is 
nobler  than  most  peers — but  I  write  in  the  heat 
of  a  feverish  election.  His  friend  found  his  sleep 
disturbed  at  night  by  the  riddle,  "What  are  we 
to  do  with  our  Meeks?"  He  tried  it,  he  says, 
upon  a  duchess  and  a  viceroy  and  a  party  whip. 
The  problem  played  about  the  Sunday's  dinner- 
table,  but  got  no  hint  of  a  solution. 

"What  to  do  with  our  Meeks?"     I  find  creep- 


xxvi  INTRODUCTION 

ing  into  the  revised  proofs  of  this  book,  a  rather 
touching  belief  on  our  author's  part  that  those 
excellent  and  energetic  people  who  are  now 
setting  out  to  "Break  up  the  Poor  Law,"  will 
make  things  mysteriously  better  for  Meek  and  his 
kind.  There  is  going  to  be  a  wonderful  new  or- 
ganization, devised  with  obscure  assistance  by  Mr. 
and  Mrs.  Sidney  Webb,  that  will  "do  everything." 
Among  other  things  there  are  to  be  certain 
"Detention  Colonies  of  a  reformatory  type"; 
and  a  careful  perusal  of  the  publications  of  the 
Minority  Report  of  the  Poor  Law  Commission, 
side  by  side  with  Mr.  Meek's  confessions,  leaves 
me  with  an  uncomfortable  feeling  that  that  is 
about  where  Mr.  Meek  would  fall  under  the  new 
order  of  things.  At  one  point  in  his  chequered 
career  Mr.  Meek  ceased  for  a  time  to  be  known  by 
his  proper  name  and  became  D  12.  He  then  inter- 
viewed a  prison  governor  and  a  number  of  warders 
and  formed  an  unfavourable  impression.  Exactly 
the  same  class  of  men  will  supply  the  rank  and 
file  of  the  officials  in  the  "Detention  Colony  of  a 
reformatory  type."  They  will  be  supplemented, 
no  doubt,  by  intelligent  persons  drawn  from  among 
the  active  spirits  in  that  political  club  with  which 
his  relations  became  strained.  On  the  whole  I 
think  Mr.  Meek  will  not  only  be  happier,  but 
socially  more  profitable,  scribbling  his  impressions 
of  our  enigmatical  and  still  largely  unreformed 
universe  during  a  phase  of  "discontinuous  em- 


INTRODUCTION  xxvii 

ployment."  I  am  afraid,  in  spite  of  his  sanguine 
note,  that  the  Minority  Report  is  no  effective 
solution  of  the  riddle  of  what  to  do  with  our 
Meeks. 

Meanwhile,  Mr.  Meek  has  decided  what  to  do 
with  himself,  and  has  sampled  life  for  the  intelli- 
gent reader  at  a  level  at  which  I  do  not  think  it 
has  ever  been  sampled  with  any  vividness  before. 
And  what  a  horrible  state  of  affairs  it  is,  this 
unavoidably  dingy,  unavoidably  dirty,  pinched 
insecurity!  When  I  think  of  this  man's  brain 
going  in  the  midst  of  that  life,  and  going  with 
a  certain  'undeniable  fineness,  fearing,  hoping, 
rejoicing,  whetting  itself  upon  occasional  books, 
getting  hold  of  the  extensive  theorizing  of  Social- 
ism, arguing  about  fate  and  politics  with  the 
other  chair-men  on  the  rank,  sitting  down  in  a 
comfortless  room  to  that  projected  work  on 
Ethics,  with  a  copying-ink  pencil  and  a  blue-ruled 
penny  exercise  book,  I  am  amazed  at  the  un- 
conquerable pertinacity  of  the  literary  spirit. 

Mr.  Meek  has  convinced  me  that  human  life 
means  to  get  itself  stated,  and  that  nothing  can 
gag  it.  For  after  all,  wherever  our  lot  or  our 
quality  takes  us  writers,  our  business  is  to  state 
life — and  for  us,  when  that  is  done,  then  every- 
thing is  done. 

H.  G.  WELLS. 


CONTENTS 


CHAP.  PASK 

I  BIRTH,  PARENTAGE  AND  EARLY  DAYS       .  I 

II  BOYHOOD  IN  THE  COUNTRY               .            .  l6 

III  LATER  SCHOOLDAYS      .            .             .  3O 

IV  GOING  TO  WORK             ....  39 
V  COUNTRY  AND  TOWN   ....  49 

VI  BACK  TO  EASTBOURNE  ...  59 

VII  LONDON  AND  NEW  YORK  .  .  .  80 

VIII  AN  AMERICAN  FARM  ....  88 

IX  SPRING  ON  THE  FARM.  ...  95 

X  LEAVING  AMERICA  .  .  .  .  IOI 

XI  RUTH  106 


xxx  CONTENTS 


CHAT. 


XII  LOVERS  UNDER  THE  ROSE   .  .  .        1  16 

XIII  THE  LIBERAL  CLUB       .  .  .        123 

XIV  ODDS  AND  ENDS  .  .  .  135 
XV  A  YEAR  OF  DARK  DAYS            .             .             .       140 

XVI  I  ADOPT  MY  PROFESSION        .  .  .        149 

XVII  THE  CURSE  OF  CASUAL  EMPLOYMENT      .        159 

XVIII  THE  BRIGHTER  SIDE  OF  CHAIR-WORK      .         169 

xix  "DEVANT  LES  SCENES"       .         .         .177 

XX  OTHER  LOVES      .....        1  82 

XXI  FIELD  LANE          .  .  .  .  .187 

XXII  GOING  TO  THE  DEVIL  .  ,  .  .194 

XXIII  HOME  AND  MARRIED  LIFE     .  .  .        2O2 

XXIV  THE  LOWEST  DEPTH     ....        2CK) 

XXV  SOME  MORE  OF  OUR  HOMES  AND  A  FEW 

OF  OUR  LODGERS  226 


CONTENTS  xxxi 

CHAP.  PAGE 

XXVI      THE  PLEASURES  OF  LIFE         .  .             .      235 

XXVII      MY  SOCIALIST  WORK     .             .  •                      .      240 

XXVIII      TRYING  TO  CLIMB          .            .  .            ,      264 

EPILOGUE              .            .            .  .                    277 


GEORGE  MEEK 

BATHCHAIR-MAN 


CHAPTER  I 

BIRTH,  PARENTAGE  AND  EARLY  DAYS 

I  WAS  born  in  a  small  cottage  in  East  Street, 
Eastbourne,  just  behind  the  "Rose  and  Crown" 
public-house,  on  Whit  Monday,  June  I,  1868. 
My  father's  family  was  of  Scottish  descent.  It 
had,  I  understand,  migrated  from  Inverness  to 
Leith  and  from  Leith  to  Hastings.  Here  my 
father  was  born,  the  youngest  but  one  of  a  large 
family. 

His  father  appears  to  have  earned  a  precarious 
livelihood  by  gathering,  cutting  and  polishing 
agates.  These  are  to  be  found  on  the  southern 
beaches,  and  some  of  them  are,  I  believe,  of 
considerable  value.  There  was  formerly  a  very 
good  collection  of  them  at  the  Wish  Tower 
Museum  in  Eastbourne,  but  that  has  been  trans- 
ferred to  the  Technical  Institute  in  Grove  Road. 


I  do  not  remember  my  father  nor  any  mem- 
ber of  his  family.  My  grandfather  Meek  was, 
I  should  say,  one  of  those  people  who  hoard 
up  their  money  for  a  time  and  then  make  ducks 
and  drakes  of  it.  My  mother  used  to  say  I 
"took  after"  him.  I  may  do,  so  far  as  the 
"ducks  and  drakes"  are  concerned,  but  I  certainly 
do  not  with  respect  to  the  hoarding.  Once 
when  a  lad  I  saved  my  pence  for  some  time  until 
a  curious  money-box,  which  my  mother  had  sent 
me  from  America,  should  have  contained  at  least 
five  shillings,  but  when  I  went  to  it  one  day  I 
found  it  empty.  My  bank  had  "suspended  pay- 
ment," and  I  have  never  felt  tempted  to  save 
money  since. 

My  father  had  four  brothers  and  a  sister. 
Two  or  three  of  the  brothers  joined  the  Royal 
Navy,  which  they  deserted  to  settle  in  the  Colonies 
or  the  U.  S.  A.  The  youngest  brother  became, 
like  my  father,  a  plasterer,  and,  like  the  Atridae, 
they  married  two  sisters.  The  remarkable  open- 
ing up  of  the  country  caused  by  the  introduction 
of  railroads  gave  a  great  impetus  to  the  building 
trade.  Fashionable  watering-places  sprang  up 
like  mushrooms  where  previously  only  small  fish- 
ing towns  and  villages  had  been.  Amongst  these 
Hastings  and  Eastbourne  were  of  the  earliest  to 
benefit :  to  which  fact  is  due  the  circumstance  that 
my  father,  coming  from  Hastings  to  Eastbourne 
in  the  course  of  his  employment,  met  my  mother. 


PARENTAGE  AND  EARLY  DAYS  3 

She  came  of  an  entirely  different  stock.  He 
was  probably  descended  from  wild  highlandmen 
and  predatory  Norse  (Bjornson  has  two  or  three 
characters  named  "Meek"  in  one  of  his  books — 
In  God's  Way),  but  she  came  of  a  family  of 
peasants  from  the  English  Midlands.  My  father 
was  very  tall;  she  was  very  short  and  slight,  with 
nearly  black  hair,  blue  eyes,  a  large  nose  and  a 
gay  but  uncertain  temper;  an  active,  restless 
little  woman;  very  clean,  but  full  of  whims  and 
always  chattering.  A  clean  housewife,  though 
a  bad  manager,  unable  to  take  care  of  money. 

She  was  the  youngest  of  three  sisters.  The 
other  two,  one  of  whom  married  my  father's 
youngest  brother,  died  while  I  was  very  young. 
I  remember  neither  of  them,  but  one  of  them 
left  a  son  who  was  brought  up  with  me  until  I 
was  twelve  years  old.  He  was  four  and  a  half 
years  older  than  I  was.  These  three  sisters 
had  lost  their  mother  when  they  were  quite 
young,  and  their  father — my  grandfather — had 
married  again,  giving  them  as  step-mother  a 
woman  who  had  been  betrayed  in  her  young 
days  and  had  a  son.  No  children  were  born  of 
my  grandfather's  second  marriage. 

He  was  a  native  of  Finmer,  a  small  village 
on  the  borders  of  Oxfordshire  and  Buckingham- 
shire. In  his  young  days,  while  employed  in 
London,  he  had  taught  himself  to  read  and  write. 
Later  he  had  been  in  some  sort  of  service  under 


4 

the  last  Duke  of  Buckingham  at  Stowe  House, 
Buckinghamshire,  but  in  what  capacity  I  do  not 
know.  There  used  to  be  a  good  deal  of  talk 
of  poachers  and  poaching,  so  I  should  say  he 
was  either  an  under-gamekeeper  or  one  of  their 
natural  enemies — a  poacher  himself. 

Whan  the  Duke  of  Buckingham  died  there 
was  a  great  sale  at  Stowe  House,  at  which,  I 
have  heard  my  grandfather  say,  a  Lord  Roths- 
child outbid  the  late  Queen  Victoria  for  a  valuable 
bedstead.  He  himself  bought  some  old  Windsor 
chairs  from  the  kitchen,  which,  with  their  brightly 
burnished  brass  crests — consisting  of  a  sheaf  of 
wheat  surmounted  by  a  crown  and  surrounded  by 
a  motto — were  among  the  most  familiar  objects 
of  my  early  childhood.  When,  in  after  years,  my 
grandmother  died  and  left  them  to  me  with  the 
rest  of  her  furniture,  being  out  of  work  I  was  glad 
of  the  fancy  price  they  fetched. 

My  mother's  family  came  to  the  neighbour- 
hood of  Eastbourne  from  Buckinghamshire  with 
a  farmer  named  Paxton,  who  had  taken  a  farm 
at  Willingdon.  Here  they  occupied  an  old  flint 
cottage  which  stood  upon  the  corner  of  the  main 
road  and  Church  Street  where  "Flint  House" 
now  stands.  Leaving  Mr.  Paxton's  service  after 
a  time  my  grandfather  entered  that  of  another 
farmer  named  Reid  at  Jevington.  Here  he  did 
some  poaching.  My  grandmother  has  often 
spoken  of  burying  fur  and  feathers  to  elude  the 


PARENTAGE  AND  EARLY  DAYS  5 

search  of  their  cottage  made  for  them  by  game- 
keepers. Butcher's  meat  was  scarce  and  dear  in 
the  country  in  those  days.  I  do  not  suppose  my 
grandfather's  wages  were  very  high.  There  were 
three  growing  girls  to  be  kept,  and  doubtless  an 
occasional  hare  or  partridge  was  acceptable. 

At  this  period  the  countryside  was  frequented 
by  a  "natural"  named  Mike,  an  eccentric 
character  of  whom  a  few  anecdotes  may  be 
given.  Asked  one  day  by  the  village  parson 
which  he  would  have,  a  half-crown  or  a  half- 
sovereign,  he  answered,  "I  won't  be  greedy,  I  '11 
take  the  little  one  "  He  used  to  hawk  brimstone 
matches — which  he  made  himself.  One  day  he 
had  lit  a  fire  in  a  lane  to  melt  the  brimstone 
when  a  farmer  who  was  passing  by  kicked  it  out. 
Mike  hawked  his  matches  without  the  brimstone, 
telling  the  cottagers  who  complained  that  he 
could  n't  help  it :  Jemmy  Reid  had  kicked  his 
fire  out.  When  his  mother  died  (under,  I  pre- 
sume, some  hedgerow)  the  overseers  of  the  parish 
in  which  it  happened  gave  him  half-a-crown  to 
carry  her  body  into  the  next  parish,  and  when 
she  was  buried  he  laid  her  shawl  on  her  grave 
"to  keep  her  warm." 

At  Jevington  at  that  time  lived  a  girl  who  had 
been  born  without  arms.  She  was  a  school- 
fellow of  my  mother,  who  said  that  when  they 
were  playing  some  kind  of  game  with  a  ball 
"she  would  kick  her  slipper  off  and  hit  the  ball 


6  GEORGE  MEEK 

with  her  foot."  When  she  was  married  she 
signed  the  register  with  her  toes.  She  was 
shown  doing  this  in  a  contemporary  illustrated 
paper.  Afterwards  she  kept  her  house  clean 
and  washed  and  dressed  her  children,  when  they 
were  born,  with  her  feet,  but  she  kept  her  cot- 
tage door  locked  so  that  no  one  should  see  how 
it  was  done.  She  is,  I  believe,  still  living  in 
Eastbourne. 

About  1862  my  grandfather  moved  into  East- 
bourne, where  he  entered  the  employment  of 
James  Peerless,  the  builder,  as  a  carter.  He 
stayed  with  him  twelve  years,  receiving  eighteen 
shillings  per  week  wages.  In  '66  or  '67  my 
father  and  mother  became  acquainted  and  were 
married. 

When  I  was  born  I  had  such  bright  blue  eyes 
(like  my  mother's)  that  she  very  foolishly  exposed 
them  too  much  to  the  light.  Consequently  I 
caught  a  cold  in  them,  which  turning  to  inflamma- 
tion I  became,  for  a  time,  quite  blind.  I  was  taken 
to  Guy's  Hospital  and  the  Ophthalmic  at  Moor- 
fields,  and  in  time  recovered  the  sight  of  one  of 
them.  That  of  the  other  was  irretrievably  lost.  My 
mother  said  that  the  optic  nerve  was  destroyed ; 
but  as  there  appears  to  be  neither  pupil  nor  iris, 
and  it  is  without  any  sense  of  light  or  darkness,  I 
should  say  the  whole  eye  has  gone.  So  that  I 
have  been  heavily  handicapped  from  the  very 
beginning. 


I  ran  the  gauntlet  of  the  usual  number  of 
childish  complaints :  scarlatina,  scarlet-fever,  meas- 
les and  so  forth,  which,  as  I  was  very  fragile 
and  there  was  neither  a  local  sanatorium  nor  the 
present-day  advance  in  sanitation  and  medical 
knowledge,  was  surprising. 

I  do  not  remember  my  mother  at  this  time  nor 
my  father  at  all.  There  was  a  slump  in  the 
building  trade  in  Eastbourne  in  the  winter  of 
*7O-'7i,  and  he,  with  many  others,  was  thrown 
out  of  work.  For  a  time  he  appears  to  have 
been  engaged  upon  relief  work,  breaking  flints 
on  the  Grand  Parade.  A  fellow  plasterer,  who 
is  now  a  bathchair-man,  has  spoken  to  me  of 
working  with  him  there.  However,  he  raised 
the  money  somehow  to  emigrate  to  America, 
where  he  obtained  employment  at  his  trade  in 
Brooklyn,  New  York,  a  week  after  landing. 

He  was,  I  should  say,  a  good  mechanic.  He 
did  the  mouldings  on  the  ceilings  in  the  recep- 
tion-rooms in  the  older  part  of  the  Cavendish 
Hotel,  and  for  years  afterwards  we  had  a  large 
medallion  in  plaster  of  Shakespeare  which  he 
made. 

My  mother  followed  him  shortly  afterwards. 
She  made  the  voyage  in  a  sailing  ship,  and  it 
occupied  fourteen  weeks.  A  younger  brother 
of  mine,  whom  she  took  with  her,  died  soon 
after  they  got  to  America.  I  was  left  behind 
with  my  grandfather  and  grandmother,  who 


8  GEORGE  MEEK 

were  both  much  attached  to  me,  and  who  feared, 
as  I  was  so  delicate,  I  should  not  stand  the  voyage 
or  the  change  of  climate. 

My  very  earliest  recollection  is  of  my  first 
day  at  school.  If  I  am  to  believe  my  mother, 
I  was  only  two  and  a  half  years  old.  But  I 
remember  the  occasion  distinctly.  We  sat  on  low 
benches  on  a  low  sloping  "gallery"  in  the  morning, 
and  in  the  afternoon  I  remember  the  teacher 
chalking  the  figures  I  to  9  on  the  black-board. 

I  dimly  remember  my  "uncle  Charlie,"  the 
son  my  grandmother  had  before  marriage,  and 
I  distinctly  remember  his  wife,  a  sensuous  woman 
with  long  dark  curls.  They  had  a  talking  magpie 
which  they  took  to  Ohio  with  them. 

The  pair  had  no  children  when  they  left  England. 
In  America  they  had  a  son,  who  was  christened 
"Prince  Otto"  after  a  character  in  either  The 
Farmer  of  Inglewood  Forest  or  The  Children  of  the 
Abbey — I  do  not  know  which,  as  I  have  read 
neither  of  them. 

My  home  life  during  this  period  was  very 
happy.  My  grandparents  were  very  good  to 
me,  and  although  we  were  poor  we  never  knew 
what  it  was  to  want.  My  grandmother  went  out 
to  work  occasionally,  but  not,  I  think,  regularly. 
I  can  remember  her  at  a  laundry  in  Cavendish 
Place,  where  I  was  anxious  to  turn  the  mangle; 
but  I  remember  more  distinctly  her  lace-making. 
She  had  a  "pillow"  and  boxes  of  "bobbins," 


PARENTAGE  AND  EARLY  DAYS  9 

and  with  these  she  made  excellent  hand  lace. 
She  told  me  in  after  years  that  she  used  to  sit 
on  the  beach  in  front  of  the  Grand  Parade  with 
this  work  in  the  summer  time  and  that  she  found 
some  good  customers  for  it  among  the  passing 
gentry.  I  remember  that  one  day  she  went  over 
the  rocks  close  to  the  Wish  Tower  to  gather 
limpets,  and  that  she  fell  and  cut  her  face  dread- 
fully. Also,  about  this  time,  I  had  some  kind 
of  formation  growing  above  my  left  eye  which 
had  to  be  plastered  up,  and  my  grandfather 
made  a  final  plaster  with  cobbler's  wax  which 
was  most  difficult  and  painful  to  remove. 

Part  of  the  time  we  lived  in  a  little  two-roomed 
cottage  in  a  yard,  or  "close,"  off  Grove  Road. 
This  has  since  been  demolished.  Here,  I  re- 
member, my  grandfather  brought  out  his  gun 
and  shot  some  starlings,  which  he  had,  baked  in 
a  pie,  for  supper.  I  think  I  must  have  been 
left  by  myself  a  great  deal,  or  at  most  with  my 
cousin,  a  lad  who  at  that  time  could  not  have 
been  more  than  seven  or  eight  years  old.  There 
are  recollections  of  lonely  meals  I  ate,  of  no 
care  except  from  him,  of  long  evenings  spent 
waiting  for  grandfather  and  grandmother  to 
come  home. 

They  always  came  home  sober.  I  do  not  re- 
member seeing  my  grandfather  the  worse  for 
drink  except  on  one  occasion,  and  that  was  on 
a  Christmas  Day.  He  had  a  glass  or  two  of 


10 

ale  every  day,  but  I  gather  that  he  never  ex- 
ceeded. My  grandmother  was  never  addicted  to 
drink.  She  was  careful,  fond  of  her  home, 
making  no  silly  pretensions,  but  just  anxious  to 
live  a  quiet,  comfortable  life.  One  incident  I 
recall  with  reference  to  her  at  this  time.  She 
had  bought  a  new  pair  of  boots  at  a  local  shop 
on  a  Saturday  night.  On  Sunday  she  and  grand- 
father went  for  a  walk  along  the  sands,  and  the 
soles  of  her  new  boots  fell  off! 

She  loomed  very  large  in  my  early  days. 
When  she  was  at  home  I  spent  most  of  my  out- 
of-school  hours  with  her.  When  I  was  sick — I 
remember  only  one  occasion,  when  I  had  the 
measles — she  nursed  me,  giving  me,  by  the 
doctor's  orders,  port  wine,  a  drink  which  I  pre- 
ferred very  much  to  the  nasty  medicine.  For 
some  years  afterwards  whenever  I  felt  I  wanted 
something  particularly  nice  I  complained  of  feel- 
ing ill,  and  begged  for  more  port  wine.  Then 
I  had  trouble  with  my  teeth,  which  she  tried  to 
relieve  by  rubbing  my  gums  with  coarse  salt. 

Also  there  were  warm  baths  and  shower  baths, 
the  latter  administered  by  means  of  a  garden 
watering-pot;  nauseous  castor-oil  every  now  and 
then;  pennies  for  sweets,  which  were  often  spent 
in  children's  books.  Of  these  I  acquired  quite 
a  large  collection,  and  my  grandfather  bound 
them  into  one  large  volume.  I  suppose  I  could 
not  read  very  well  at  that  time,  as  I  used  to  get 


PARENTAGE  AND  EARLY  DAYS  11 

him,  when  I  bought  a  new  book,  to  read  it  to 
me. 

The  last  year  or  two  of  our  stay  in  Eastbourne 
we  occupied  three  back  rooms  in  a  house  in 
Cross  Street,  for  which,  I  understand,  my  people 
paid  four  shillings  and  sixpence  per  week.  While 
we  were  there  the  notable  fire  at  Peerless*  yard 
occurred. 

It  was  my  habit  on  fine  days,  though  I  was 
very  young,  to  go  up  and  meet  my  grandfather 
in  the  evening  when  his  work  was  done.  I 
believe  I  spent  much  of  my  spare  time  with  him. 
I  remember  going  to  the  brick-yards  with  him, 
where  I  used  to  watch  him  load  his  cart  with 
bricks.  He  put  on  his  hands  a  pair  of  leather 
things  like  gloves  with  no  backs  to  them.  Then 
a  man  would  throw  bricks  to  him,  three  at  a 
time,  from  a  large  stack;  these  he  caught,  piling 
them  in  his  cart. 

It  was  amusing  when  I  walked  home  with 
him  to  hear  the  tramp,  tramp  of  his  great  hob- 
nailed boots  and  the  pitter,  patter  of  my  little 
ones.  On  the  night  of  the  fire  I  went  up  to  the 
yard  in  Langney  Road  as  usual.  Here  I  saw 
young  Mr.  Peerless,  the  son  of  the  proprietor, 
and,  looking  round  at  the  great  stacks  of  timber, 
I  remarked  to  him,  in  my  wisdom,  ''You  will 
have  a  fire  here  one  of  these  nights."  I  think 
my  cousin  Harry  had  set  our  own  kitchen  chim- 
ney on  fire  with  sawdust  and  shavings  a  night  or 


12  GEORGE  MEEK 

two  before,  which,  I  suppose,  suggested  the  idea 
to  me.  At  all  events  the  place  did  catch  fire 
that  night.  My  grandfather  was  called  out  of 
bed  to  get  the  horses  out  of  the  stable,  and  I 
saw  the  smoking  ruins  the  next  morning.  It 
was,  I  believe,  the  largest  fire  Eastbourne  has 
ever  known.  The  yard  where  it  occurred — at 
present  occupied  by  Peerless,  Dennis  and  Co. — 
abuts  on  a  brewery,  and  fearing  it  might  spread 
the  owners  of  the  latter  had  all  the  wines,  beers 
and  spirits  taken  from  the  cellars  and  placed  in 
the  open  street  in  Lismore  Road,  where  the 
militia  or  the  volunteers  were  called  upon  to 
guard  them.  The  people  in  the  opposite  houses 
in  Langney  Road  hung  wet  blankets  out  of  their 
windows  to  keep  their  houses  from  catching 
fire. 

I  do  not  remember  much  of  my  school  life 
during  these  years.  I  attended  the  infant  school 
in  Meads  Road,  which  was  founded  by  a  lady 
member  of  the  Cavendish  family,  for  a  time,  and 
those  attached  to  Trinity  Church  and  Christ 
Church.  From  the  latter — a  little  flint  box  which 
stands  in  the  churchyard — I  one  day  played 
truant,  taking  our  landlady's  children  with  me 
to  gather  blackberries  on  the  Crumbles.  Our 
landlady  gave  me  a  hiding,  the  first  I  ever  re- 
member having.  I  was  not  six  years  old,  and 
the  blackberries  were  green! 

There  were  many  Sunday  excursions  with  my 


PARENTAGE  AND  EARLY  DAYS  13 

own  people.  One  to  Willingdon,  by  a  footpath 
where  Upperton  Road  now  stands.  Arrived  at 
the  pretty  cottage  of  an  aunt  and  uncle  at  that 
village,  a  cottage  which  stood  on  a  bank,  behind 
a  garden  full  of  bright  flowers,  we  had  a  grand 
country  dinner  of  boiled  bacon,  potatoes,  broad 
beans  and  pudding,  which  I  know  I,  for  one, 
enjoyed.  Then  there  were  long  walks  to  see 
"Earp's  Mansion,"  a  big  new  house  built  with- 
out chimneys  by  a  Buckinghamshire  gentleman 
who,  I  have  been  told,  had  made  a  great  deal  of 
money  by  running  the  blockade  from  Richmond 
during  the  American  Civil  War  with  three  ship- 
loads of  cotton.  This  house  is  now  called  "The 
Cliff,"  and  has  been  used  for  some  years  as  a 
ladies'  school.  The  same  gentleman  built  the 
original  Grand  Hotel,  which  was,  for  some  years, 
a  failure. 

Also  I  remember  seeing  the  Devonshire  Park 
and  Baths  while  the  former  was  being  laid  out 
and  the  latter  built.  There  was  no  parade  be- 
yond the  Wish  Tower  to  the  west  or  the  Albion 
Hotel  to  the  east  in  those  days.  Where  the 
residential  west  ward  is  now  built  used  to  be 
farm  land.  The  working  class  "Marsh"  quarter 
was  marsh  land,  meadows  in  which  we  gathered 
sorrel  and  floated  along  the  intersecting  ditches 
upon  mortar-boards.  No  houses  should  have 
been  built  upon  the  land  or  upon  the  still  more 
swampy  soil  farther  east,  but  the  interests  of 


14  GEORGE  MEEK 

private  property  owners  outweigh  those  of  public 
health. 

In  these  meadows,  close  to  where  we  lived, 
there  used  sometimes  to  be  swings  and  round- 
abouts, and  sometimes  circuses.  Then,  once  a 
year,  there  was  the  Guy  Fawkes  procession,  a 
glorious,  exciting  event  with  many  torches  and 
fireworks,  some  of  the  latter  dangerously  virile. 
And  there  was  always  the  beach.  I  do  not  re- 
member ever  being  hungry  or  cold,  ill-shod  or 
ill-clothed  during  these  years;  they  were,  I  be- 
lieve, very  happy  ones  indeed.  I  think  I  could 
read  and  write  "print"  before  I  was  six  years 
old.  At  any  rate  I  wrote  some  letters  to  my 
mother  in  America  in  that  way  during  this  time. 
I  do  not  remember  being  beaten  or  caned  at  any 
of  the  infant  schools  I  attended  in  Eastbourne. 
During  her  first  year  at  school  my  little  daughter, 
aged  then  five,  came  home  with  her  hands  so 
badly  beaten  she  could  not  bear  any  one  to  touch 
them,  so  that  it  appears  the  treatment  of  school 
children  has  not  improved  so  very  greatly. 

In  1874,  when  I  was  six  years  old,  my  grand- 
father gave  up  his  place  at  Peerless  the  builder's 
and  took  service  as  ploughman  with  a  farmer 
named  Edwards  at  Jevington,  a  village  five  miles 
over  the  hills  and  seven  miles  by  road  from 
Eastbourne. 

Before  leaving  this  part  of  my  life  I  have  one 
episode  to  record.  The  builder,  Peerless,  by 


PARENTAGE  AND  EARLY  DAYS  15 

whom  my  grandfather  was  employed,  obtained 
the  contract  to  build  a  new  workhouse  at  Chailey, 
a  small  village  in  mid-Sussex.  My  grandfather 
and  uncle  Charlie,  the  sawyer,  were  employed 
upon  it.  They  took  me  with  them.  I  do  not 
remember  either  going  or  returning  to  this  place, 
but  I  remember  that  we  slept  in  a  ground-floor 
room,  which  smelt  of  new  wood  and  fresh  paint, 
in  a  finished  part  of  the  building,  and  that  there 
was  great  difficulty  in  finding  water.  A  well  was 
being  bored  and  it  had  to  be  carried  very  deep. 
I  saw  the  men  descending,  two  at  a  time,  one  on 
each  side  of  what  looked  like  a  long  section  of 
water-pipe,  with  two  transverse  bars,  upon  one 
of  which  they  stood  while  they  held  on  by  the 
other,  which  was  above  their  heads. 


CHAPTER  II 

BOYHOOD  IN  THE  COUNTRY 

MY  grandfather  was  allowed  the  use  of  a  farm 
wagon  to  remove  our  furniture  from  Eastbourne 
to  Jevington.  This,  drawn  by  three  huge  brown 
horses  whose  names  I  subsequently  learned  were 
"Cubit,"  "Captain"  and  "Smiler,"  caused  me 
great  wonder.  It  had  no  tail-board  at  the  back, 
simply  a  wooden  bar  across  the  top  from  side  to 
side,  and  at  the  bottom  a  roller,  through  two  holes 
in  which  long  loose  pegs  were  passed.  This,  I 
learned  afterwards,  was  used  when  the  wagon 
was  loaded  very  high  (with  hay  or  corn,  for  in- 
stance) to  tighten  the  ropes  which  were  passed 
over  it  from  the  front.  The  horses  were  gay 
with  much  jingling,  brightly  burnished  brass 
about  their  harness,  and  blue,  red  and  yellow 
ribbons  on  their  bridles. 

I,  my  grandmother  and  my  cousin  Harry  rode 
on  top  of  the  furniture.  I  do  not  remember 
much  of  the  journey,  except  that  when  we  had 
passed  Wannock  Glen  my  cousin  got  down 
and  gathered  a  large  bunch  of  primroses  for  me, 

16 


BOYHOOD  IN  THE  COUNTRY  17 

so  it  must  have  been  in  the  early  spring.  It 
is  curious  how  little  incidents  of  this  kind  are 
retained  in  the  memory.  I  can  see  him  now,  a 
rough-clad  little  boy,  handing  the  big  bunch  of 
yellow  flowers  up  to  me  as  I  sat  on  the  wagon. 

When  we  reached  our  little  cottage  we  found 
there  was  no  fire-grate  in  it.  A  broken  one  was 
borrowed.  This  had  to  be  kept  upright  with 
two  or  three  loose  bricks.  It  had  originally  been 
a  four-legged  affair,  but  two  of  the  legs  had  been 
broken  off.  We  made  shift  with  this  for  a  time 
until  a  new  one  was  bought.  When  my  grand- 
mother wanted  to  make  a  cake  for  Sunday's  tea, 
and  was  not  using  the  large  brick  oven  in  the 
washhouse,  she  baked  it  by  placing  it  under  the 
grate  with  a  sheet  of  tin  over  it  to  keep  the  ashes 
from  falling  into  it.  This  cottage  can  still  be 
seen.  It  stands  on  the  right,  just  inside  the 
upper  end  of  the  village,  opposite  a  large  barn. 

They  found  that  my  cousin  Harry  was  not 
needed,  so  they  sent  him  into  the  workhouse. 
But  he  was  not  there  long.  My  grandfather, 
much  to  my  delight,  fetched  him  out  to  be 
his  ploughboy.  Poor  Harry  never  had  much 
education. 

The  next  few  years  are  crowded  with  memories 
and  impressions.  My  school  life  was  an  event- 
ful one.  The  village  school  was  managed  by  a 
retired  naval  man  and  his  daughter,  assisted  by 
a  pupil  teacher.  A  great  stickler  for  the  Church 


18  GEORGE  MEEK 

and  Church  teaching,  he  soon  initiated  me  into 
its  meaning.  I  found  that  while  the  children  of 
one  or  two  well-to-do  people  were  screened  and 
pampered,  the  portion  of  the  cottager's  child 
was  mostly  knocks.  Although  I  was  scarcely 
seven  years  old,  I  was  punished  daily.  The 
great  trouble  was  my  writing.  Somehow  I  could 
not  acquire  the  graceful  sloping  style  similar  to 
that  used  in  engravings  which  ~Vas  expected  of 
us.  Consequently  my  young  head  was  the  con- 
stant recipient  of  hard  blows  from  the  school- 
master's black  ruler,  and  I  was  so  frequently 
caned  that  my  hands  became  too  sore  to  hold 
the  pen.  I  remember  one  occasion  very  well. 
I  had  a  severe  cold  in  my  eyes,  and  could  scarcely 
distinguish  the  lines  upon  which  I  was  supposed 
to  write;  everything  appeared  as  through  a  thick 
mist.  This,  however,  did  not  screen  me  from 
punishment.  I  felt  so  bitterly  the  injustice 
meted  out  to  me  that  I  went  home  and  complained 
to  my  grandfather.  He  was  so  angry  that, 
meeting  the  school-master  in  the  street,  he 
threatened  to  thrash  him,  and  he  would  not  let 
me  go  to  school  again  for  some  months.  Finally 
the  school-attendance  officer  intervened  and  made 
peace  between  them. 

On  the  first  day  of  my  return  to  school  the 
pedagogue  assembled  the  whole  of  the  children 
and  gave  them  a  long  address  about  me  and  my 
wickedness.  Most  impressively  he  assured  them 


BOYHOOD  IN  THE  COUNTRY  19 

that  he  should  detail  the  incident  in  his  "log 
book"! 

I  do  not  remember  much  else  of  my  school 
days  there  except  that  the  daughter  was  almost 
as  unkind  to  me  as  the  father.  She  afterwards 
married  the  farmer  for  whom  my  grandfather 
worked;  at  that  time  he  had  a  housekeeper  who 
had  a  son — a  fair-haired  boy — who  was  my  first 
great  friend.  We  were  inseparable.  Whatever 
mischief  was  afoot  at  our  end  of  the  village  we 
were  in  it — generally  the  ringleaders.  Occasion- 
ally the  farmer  would  have  a  nephew  or  two 
staying  with  him — I  suppose  they  must  have 
been  well-to-do:  they  were  always  well-dressed 
and  always  had  plenty  of  pocket-money.  We 
tolerated  them,  but  though  they  were  glad  to 
join  in  our  games,  we  did  not  fail  to  let  them 
know  we  could  do  without  them.  We  had  our 
own  group  at  our  end  of  the  village.  There 
were  more  children  at  the  other  end  with  whom 
we  occasionally  fraternized,  but  we  were  better 
dressed  than  most  of  them.  Not  that  our  friends 
were  better  off,  only  that  they  looked  after  us 
better. 

On  December  6,  1876,  my  grandfather  received 
a  telegram  from  Brooklyn,  N.  Y.,  saying  that 
a  theatre  had  been  burnt  down,  and  my  father 
had  been  one  of  the  audience.  Shortly  after- 
wards a  letter  in  a  black-bordered  envelope  came 
from  my  mother.  My  grandfather  was  threshing 


20  GEORGE  MEEK 

oats  with  a  flail  in  one  of  the  barns.  I  was 
sent  to  him  with  it,  and  directly  he  saw  it  he 
broke  down  and  cried  like  a  child,  for  my  father 
had  been  killed  in  the  fire.  He  died  actually 
from  heart  disease,  to  which  he  was  subject,  so 
my  mother  was  told,  but  he  was  badly  burnt; 
afterwards  it  was  only  by  his  watch  that  he  was 
identified.  He  is  buried  in  Evergreen  Cemetery, 
New  York.  I  suppose,  on  the  whole,  he  must 
have  been  a  steady  man.  My  mother  used  to 
speak  of  a  terrible  wickedness  he  was  guilty  of. 
While  living  in  Eastbourne  he  ran  up  a  beer 
score  at  the  "Brighton  Arms,"  then  popularly 
known  as  "Billy  Home's,"  and  sometimes  in 
America  he  would  go  on  the  spree,  causing  her 
great  anxiety  on  account  of  the  brutality  of  the 
police,  who  in  the  Land  of  Freedom  are  very 
free  on  occasion  with  their  clubs.  One  night  in 
Brooklyn  he  came  home  with  his  overcoat  turned 
inside  out  "to  keep  it  dry."  However,  he  could 
not  have  been  so  very  bad,  as  at  the  time  of  his 
death  he  had  worked  up  a  small  business  as  a 
contracting  plasterer,  and  had  four  or  five  men 
working  for  him.  I  should  say  he  was  a  studious 
man,  as  when  my  mother  returned  to  England 
she  brought  a  large  number  of  technical  works 
on  building  construction  and  architecture  with 
her  which  he  had  left.  I  think  he  must  have 
done  well,  as  she  lived  for  over  six  months  after- 
wards in  Brooklyn,  and  had  enough  left  to  pay 


BOYHOOD  IN  THE  COUNTRY  21 

her  passage  home  and  land  with  a  considerable 
quantity  of  baggage  and  some  money. 

Her  return  was  the  occasion  of  my  first  great 
disappointment.  I  looked  forward  for  weeks  to 
the  happiness  of  meeting  her  and  my  two  brothers, 
longing  to  have  a  mother  and  brothers  like  other 
children.  But  when  she  came  I  soon  discovered 
that  all  her  affections  were  centred  in  her  other 
children,  and  I  was  left  out  in  the  cold.  She 
hated  me  for  being  nearly  blind,  and  because 
my  grandfather  and  grandmother  thought  so 
much  of  me. 

The  two  sons  she  brought  home  with  her,  one 
of  them  four  years  old,  the  other  a  few  months, 
had  been  born  in  America.  She  had  eight  children 
in  all,  four  of  whom  died,  one  in  England,  three 
in  America. 

I  remember  her  home-coming.  It  was  in  the 
summer.  They  drove  up  from  Polegate  station 
with  my  grandfather,  who  had  gone  to  meet 
them  in  a  wagonette.  They  were  very  cross 
and  tired,  and  when  I  wanted  to  be  affectionate 
I  was  repelled.  She  lived  with  us  for  some  time, 
but  she  and  my  grandmother  began  to  quarrel, 
and  she  took  a  small  two-roomed  cottage  at  the 
lower  end  of  the  village.  Her  money  being 
spent,  she  applied  for  parish  relief,  which  she 
supplemented  with  what  she  could  earn  as  a 
dressmaker. 

She  was  still  quite  young — under  thirty  years 


22 

of  age.  I  am  afraid  she  "showed  off"  her  Yankee 
accent  and  phrases  rather  amongst  the  villagers. 
I  remember  her  as  being  sometimes  kind  to  me, 
sometimes  otherwise.  She  suffered  considerably 
with  sick-headaches. 

My  life  during  these  years — from  the  age  of 
six  to  nine — was,  in  spite  of  the  cruel  school- 
master, and  latterly  of  motherly  frowns,  very 
happy.  I  took  a  keen  interest  in  everything 
about  me.  Our  cottage  was  small,  but  suf- 
ficient: a  little  white- washed  four-roomed  place 
with  leaded  windows.  The  two  lower  rooms  had 
brick  floors.  The  front  room  was  covered  with 
thick  coker-nut  matting.  In  the  back  room,  the 
"wash-house,"  was  a  large  oven,  in  which  my 
grandmother  baked  bread  and  cakes  twice  a 
week.  She  also  made  ginger-beer,  which  she 
sold  to  passers-by  and  the  village  children,  with 
sweets  and  biscuits.  She  said  that  I  ate  all  the 
profits.  The  oven  was  heated  by  burning  huge 
bundles  of  furze  in  it. 

Our  next-door  neighbours  were  the  village 
blacksmith's  two  brothers,  who  lived  with  their 
mother  and  sister.  These  were  fairly  well-to-do 
people  who  kept  bees,  and  often  gave  me  honey 
in  the  comb  and  fruit. 

On  the  other  side  was  a  large  orchard,  the 
happy  hunting-ground  of  the  village  lads  in 
autumn  as  its  owner  lived  nearly  half  a  mile  away. 

In   the   autumn    and   winter   my   grandfather 


BOYHOOD  IN  THE  COUNTRY  23 

would  go  rabbit-shooting  (he  had  the  farmer's 
permission  to  do  so  over  some  downland),  and 
often  brought  six  or  eight  brace  home  with  him, 
but  I  never  remember  seeing  him  with  a  par- 
tridge or  pheasant,  or  even  a  hare.  He  was 
fond  of  animals,  of  his  horses  and  our  domestic 
pets,  which  consisted  of  a  tabby  cat,  a  blackbird, 
a  goldfinch  and  a  number  of  tame  rabbits.  The 
cottage  had  about  ten  rods  of  garden  attached. 
This  ran  down  the  side,  the  larger  part  given 
over  to  vegetables,  but  a  long  slip  of  it  under  a 
wall  contained,  among  other  things,  flowers  the 
seeds  of  which  had  been  sent  us  from  Ohio. 
This  was  my  grandmother's  special  care.  One 
year  we  tried  to  grow  some  Indian  corn,  but 
though  it  grew  very  high  and  the  ears  developed, 
it  never  fully  ripened.  People  passing  in  car- 
riages would  often  stop  to  buy  a  bunch  of  flowers. 
My  grandmother  insisted  always  that  only 
sweet-smelling  ones  were  worth  having,  con- 
sequently in  the  summer  her  garden  scented 
the  whole  place.  There  was  a  pear  tree,  the 
special  resting-place,  I  used  to  think,  of  our  cat, 
and  in  the  wall,  serving  the  two  houses,  a  well, 
from  the  depths  of  which  the  buckets  some- 
times brought  up  bright-coloured  lizards  with 
the  water.  The  neighbours  once  gave  me  so 
much  honey  it  made  me  ill ;  too  ill  to  go  to  school 
• — so  ill,  indeed,  that  I  loathed  peppermint  drops 
and  regarded  brandy  balls  as  a  delusion  and  a 


24  GEORGE  MEEK 

snare.  And  I  had  not  been  ill  for  years — as  a  boy 
counts. 

About  this  time  a  new  family  of  working 
people  came  to  live  at  our  end  of  the  village. 
There  were  many  children,  among  them  a  girl 
of  ten  or  eleven,  who  became  at  once  in  a  child- 
ish way,  and  afterwards  in  fact,  "the  village 
flirt,"  a  la  Rabelais.  She  was  the  first  girl  of  this 
description  I  ever  met,  but  not  by  any  means 
the  last.  They  are  a  class  to  themselves  among 
women.  They  are  not  "led  astray,"  as  the  ortho- 
dox novel  would  have  us  believe;  they  lead 
others  from  the  paths  of  virtue.  Although  I 
always  went  to  mixed  schools,  and  out  of  school- 
hours  the  boys  and  girls  fraternized  in  their  play 
to  a  very  great  extent,  she  was  the  only  specimen 
of  this  type  I  knew  as  a  child.  With  this  excep- 
tion, though  the  girls  would  romp  with  us,  join 
freely  in  our  games  and  our  excursions  after 
nuts,  berries  or  flowers,  their  behaviour  towards 
us  and  ours  towards  them  was  perfectly  free  from 
any  taint  of  impropriety. 

Such  women,  however  carefully  they  are 
guarded,  and  to  whatever  class  they  belong,  will 
find  a  way  to  give  expression  to  their  individual- 
ity sooner  or  later.  George  Moore,  in  A  Drama 
in  Muslin,  portrays  one  of  them  who  had  been 
carefully  brought  up  in  a  convent,  and  that 
author  does  not,  I  believe,  usually  exaggerate  in 
the  delineation  of  character.  I  have  met  and 


BOYHOOD  IN  THE  COUNTRY  25 

heard  and  read  of  numerous  individual  women 
of  this  kind  in  various  classes  of  society.  In 
them  an  abnormal  development  of  the  sex  sense 
in  maturity  appears  to  follow  upon  its  premature 
manifestation. 

I  think  she  struck  a  jarring  note  in  my  life, 
although  it  had  little  effect  upon  my  conception 
of  women  generally.  I  suppose  I  have  to  thank 
what  little  strain  of  poetry  there  is  in  my  tem- 
perament for  the  fact  that  from  my  earliest  years 
I  have  always  been  given  to  idealizing  the  fair 
sex.  Although  my  experience  leads  me  to  con- 
clude that  I  am  mistaken,  I  always  like  to  think 
of  them  as  being  but  a  little  lower  than  the  angels. 

My  experience  has  led  me  to  divide  women 
into  three  classes.  First,  the  merely  animal, 
carried  away  by  their  lusts,  from  which  the 
majority  of  prostitutes  are  recruited.  Second, 
the  merely  superficial,  concerned  with  nothing 
but  their  daily  round  of  duties  and  their  neigh- 
bours' affairs.  This  forms  a  large  class;  they 
are  the  supporters  of  penny  novelettes;  they  have 
no  ideal  beyond  a  fine  frock  or  a  new  hat.  The 
third  comprises  the  refined,  visionary  women  of 
high  ideals  who  attempt  and  do  things;  women 
like  Julia  Dawson,  Margaret  MacMillan  and 
Mabel  Hope.  You  can  scarcely  ever  interest  the 
first  or  second  class  in  politics. 

I  was  then  nine  years  of  age,  and  I  suppose 
those  whose  children  are  watched  over  by  trained 


26  GEORGE  MEEK 

nurses  and  governesses  of  unimpeachable  re- 
spectability would  be  horrified  were  I  to  tell  just 
simply  and  plainly  all  that  was  done  by  us  little 
children,  and  just  all  the  range  of  knowledge 
our  talk  covered.  No  doubt  it  was  all  very  dread- 
ful, but  I  think  such  premature  experience  is  far 
commoner  among  poor  children — that  is  to  say, 
among  the  mass  of  the  population — than  many 
delicate-minded  people  are  disposed  to  believe. 
It  smirched  me,  no  doubt;  technically,  I  was 
"corrupted,"  but  on  the  whole,  as  I  try  to  recall 
the  phases  of  my  subsequent  development,  I  am 
bound  to  confess  I  think  it  injured  me  but  little. 
It  did  n't  a  bit  prevent  my  falling  into  the  purest 
and  tenderest  love  when  my  time  came  for  that. 
Perhaps  it  made  its  purity  possible. 

The  life  on  the  farm  interested  me  very  much. 
When  we  first  went  there,  all  the  operations — 
sowing,  mowing,  reaping  and  threshing  were 
carried  out  by  hand.  I  saw  the  steam-plough 
introduced,  the  horse-drill,  the  mowing  and 
reaping  machines  and  the  complicated  steam- 
thresher.  These  were,  of  course,  great  wonders 
to  me.  The  harvest  field  was  a  source  of  never- 
ending  fun,  the  hiding  in  "  shocks,"  helping  to 
bind  the  sheaves  or  gleaning.  Afterwards  came 
the  blackberrying  and  nutting.  On  the  whole, 
I  think  the  life  of  a  country  child  is  much  more 
interesting  than  that  of  one  in  the  town.  In  this 
village  none  of  the  other  children  was  unkind 


BOYHOOD  IN  THE  COUNTRY  27 

to  me.  Previously  in  the  town,  though  I  was 
very  little,  the  boys  used  to  chase  me,  calling 
me  "Blind-eyes."  The  same  thing  happened 
when  I  returned  to  Eastbourne  later.  I  was 
afraid  to  pass  a  Sunday-school  crowd,  because 
I  was  certain  to  be  assailed  by  derisive  cries  on 
account  of  my  sight.  It  may  be  that  in  the 
countryside  the  children  feel  more  easily  criticism 
and  observation  than  they  do  in  that  wilderness 
of  strangers  the  town. 

I  think  I  have  written  all  that  is  worth  telling 
of  my  experiences  in  this  first  village. 

My  life  at  Jevington,  as  it  appears  to  me  now 
in  the  retrospect,  was  made  up  principally  of 
mischief  and  pleasure.  The  joy  of  life  was 
strong  in  me.  I  took  great  interest  in  the  riding 
of  bare-backed  horses — more  than  one  of  which 
threw  me — and  upon  loads  of  wheat  to  the  miller's 
or  the  nearest  railway-station.  Once  we  went 
into  Eastbourne  for  a  load  of  gravel.  My  grand- 
father, with  the  other  men,  stopped  at  a  road- 
side public-house,  the  "Archery  Tavern,"  for 
lunch  (commonly  called  "bait"  amongst  them). 
They  had  beer,  and  when  one  of  them  asked 
me  what  I  would  have  (eclat,  eight!),  I  said 
"Brandy"! 

I  continued  to  be  a  great  reader.  Our  library 
was  a  limited  one,  consisting  at  first,  if  I  remember 
rightly,  of  Hume's  History  of  England,  another 
school  history  and  Sturm's  Reflections.  To  this 


28 

my  people  subsequently  added  an  illustrated 
family  Bible,  Bunyan's  Pilgrim's  Progress  and 
Holy  War,  which  they  bought  in  monthly  parts. 
The  last  I  read  with  avidity  again  and  again, 
little  thinking  that  one  of  the  tinker's  descendants 
was  to  play  a  very  important  part  in  my  own  life. 

After  my  mother's  return  from  America,  our 
people,  at  her  request,  bought  what  at  that  time 
was  called  "Book"  tea.  You  bought  so  many 
pounds  of  tea,  and  then  you  received  a  book  in 
return  for  the  coupons  attached  to  each  package. 
In  this  way  I  became  acquainted  with  Diprose's 
Annual,  1876-77,  Robinson  Crusoe  and  The  Swiss 
Family  Robinson;  the  last  was  my  favourite  amongst 
them  all. 

But  alas!  and  alas!  my  happy  days — happy 
in  spite  of  canings  and  motherly  frowns — were 
numbered.  My  grandfather  quarrelled  with  the 
farmer  for  whom  he  worked  at  Jevington,  and 
taking  service  with  another  over  the  hills  in  a 
neighbouring  village,  had  only  been  with  him 
three  weeks  when  he  died  of  bronchitis,  aged 
fifty-nine. 

His  death  was  a  great  blow  to  me.  He  had 
been  always,  if  anything,  too  kind  to  me.  He 
more  than  filled  the  place  of  my  father,  whom 
I  never  remember  seeing.  I  was  very  greatly 
attached  to  him,  and  delighted  to  be  with  him 
in  the  fields,  or  going  to  Polegate  with  him  on  a 
load  of  corn.  Sometimes  I  would  wander  away 


BOYHOOD  IN  THE  COUNTRY  29 

by  myself  among  the  hedgerows  or  over  the 
lonely  South  Downs  seeking  new  natural  curiosi- 
ties in  the  way  of  flowers,  berries  or  fungi.  Once, 
being  very  hungry,  I  ate  several  of  these  fungi, 
and  was  fearfully  sick.  Out  of  school,  within 
reasonable  limits,  I  was  allowed  to  do  pretty 
much  as  I  liked.  Under  the  hills,  just  beyond  the 
old  Church,  there  used  to  be  a  plantation  of 
wild  raspberries.  Here,  one  day,  a  badger  was 
found,  and  the  hunt  which  followed  threw  the 
village  into  great  excitement. 


CHAPTER  III 

LATER  SCHOOLDAYS 

AFTER  my  grandfather's  death  my  mother  and 
grandmother  lived  together  for  two  years  and  a 
half  at  Willingdon.  We  were  very  poor,  I  re- 
member. There  was  no  regular  income  apart 
from  some  small  relief  from  the  parish  and  my 
cousin's  earnings  as  a  carter  boy,  which  were  not 
great. 

Occasionally  my  grandmother  did  a  day's 
washing  or  charing.  My  mother  set  up  in 
business  as  a  dressmaker,  but  I  am  afraid  she  did 
not  prosper  greatly.  My  grandfather  had  been 
paid  sixteen  shillings  a  week.  In  addition  he 
had  a  cottage  rent  free.  This  had  ensured  us  a 
regular,  if  plain  living.  It  was,  I  remember, 
very  plain.  I  grew  up  thin  and  delicate.  They 
could  scarcely  ever  persuade  me  to  touch  meat 
of  any  kind,  and  prophesied  frequently  that  I 
should  never  live  to  be  twenty-one.  It  is  a  mis- 
take to  prophesy  unless  you  know,  because,  thin 
and  delicate  as  I  was  then,  I  am  now  over  forty- 
one. 

30 


LATER  SCHOOLDAYS  31 

For  breakfast  we  almost  invariably  had  soaked 
bread:  the  children's  flavoured  with  milk  and 
sugar;  the  "grown-ups'"  with  butter,  pepper  and 
salt.  Meat  was  rare.  The  Sunday  dinner  almost 
always  consisted  of  steak-puddings  or  boiled 
bacon;  during  the  week  we  sometimes  had 
liver  or  lights;  but  more  often  plain  suet-  or 
bread-pudding,  with  vegetables.  On  Sundays 
the  meat-pudding  or  bacon  was  always  followed 
by  a  fruit-pudding  of  some  kind.  We  seldom 
had  pies — they  did  n't  go  so  far  as  puddings ; 
and  roast  or  baked  joints  were  undreamed-of 
luxuries. 

At  Willingdon  the  school-master,  Mr.  Hurst, 
and  his  assistant,  Mr.  Ewins,  were  men  of  differ- 
ent calibre  to  the  Jevington  pedagogue.  They 
were,  for  that  period,  up-to-date,  taking  a  keen 
interest  in  their  scholars,  and  doing  their  best 
to  advance  them.  They  both,  I  remember,  used 
to  ride  the  old  "ordinary"  bike.  Under  their 
care  these  schooldays  at  Willingdon  were  much 
happier  than  my  earlier  ones.  I  advanced  very 
rapidly,  and  came  to  be  held  up  as  a  model  to 
those  of  more  sluggish  intelligence.  They  say 
that  "happy  is  the  people  that  has  no  history"! 
I  suppose  these  years  must  have  been  happy  for 
me,  for  they  were  most  uneventful.  Apart  from 
my  school  experiences,  I  only  remember  that  I 
was  continually  falling  in  love  with  one  or  the 
other  of  the  village  girls.  The  first  one  was  a 


32 

bewitching  brunette  named  Laura.  I  kissed  her 
one  day  in  the  school  porch.  This  heinous  out- 
rage was  reported  to  her  father,  a  Calvinistic 
shoemaker,  who,  catching  me  passing  his  house 
a  day  or  two  after,  lectured  me  for  half-an-hour 
on  my  wickedness. 

At  this  school  I  first  came  into  contact  with 
party  politics.  During  my  last  few  months  there 
the  '80  election  took  place,  and  as  a  friendly 
shoemaker — a  strong  Radical  and  an  atheist, 
who  lent  me  books — told  me  that  the  Liberals 
were  the  friends  of  the  poor  working  people,  I 
became  an  ardent  Liberal.  That  party  gained  a 
large  majority  in  the  country,  but  to  my  disgust 
they  failed  to  win  East  Sussex.  This  same  shoe- 
maker had  formerly  been  a  colporteur.  He  had 
quite  a  decent  library,  which  I  was  very  glad  to 
make  use  of.  Among  the  books  he  lent  me  the 
one  which  at  that  time  I  most  enjoyed  was 
Haydn's  Dictionary  of  Dates — a  book  which 
ought  to  be  accessible  to  all  the  scholars  in  the 
higher  standards  of  elementary  schools.  Our 
historical  courses,  as  I  remember  them,  gave  us 
only  a  narrow,  vague  view  of  the  history  of  our 
world. 

At  Willingdon  school  I  had  my  first  formal 
introduction  to  the  arts.  At  Jevington  we  had 
one  or  two  lessons  in  drawing,  but  though  I 
always  longed  to  learn  to  draw,  lessons  were  not 
always  to  be  had.  My  grandfather  had,  I  pre- 


LATER  SCHOOLDAYS  33 

sume,  a  musical  turn,  which  he  exercised  occa- 
sionally on  a  much-prized  brass  whistle,  but  I 
learned  little  or  nothing  of  the  art  and  craft  of 
music  until  I  went  to  Willingdon  school,  where, 
on  the  outbreak  of  the  Russo-Turkish  war  and 
the  Jingo  fever,  a  drum  and  fife  band  was  organ- 
ized. In  this  I  was  allowed  to  play  the  triangle; 
the  performers  on  the  fifes  facetiously  remarking 
that  I  played  the  principal  instrument,  as  I  was 
supposed  to  keep  the  rest  in  time.  Later,  the 
bass  drummer  resigning  his  post,  I  was  pro- 
moted to  that  dignity.  We  used  to  march  round 
the  village  making  collections  towards  the  cost  of 
our  instruments,  music  and  gold-braided  caps. 
While  I  was  big  drummer  Miss  Heinemann 
(whose  family  at  that  time  lived  at  Ratton,  the 
residence  of  the  Hon.  Freeman  Thomas,  M.P.) 
was  married.  This  was  made  the  occasion  of  a 
great  fete  in  Ratton  Bottom — a  little  valley  below 
Ratton  Place.  Our  band  was  requisitioned.  As 
I  was  at  most  only  eleven  years  of  age,  it  was 
necessary  for  another  small  boy  to  march  along 
and  help  carry  my  drum  while  I  belaboured  it. 
Going  back  into  the  village  at  the  conclusion  of 
this  fete,  we  had  to  climb  a  rather  steep  slope. 
Here  my  assistant  let  go  of  our  instrument,  and 
I  rolled  back  with  the  drum  on  top  of  me,  beat- 
ing away  till  I  was  picked  up. 

This  Miss  Heinemann's  family  were  very  good 
to  the  village  children.     On  the  occasion  of  her 


34  GEORGE  MEEK 

marriage  each  child  was  given  a  post-office  bank- 
book with  a  shilling  in  it  to  their  credit,  to  in- 
duce them  to  learn  to  save.  Mine  was  soon 
withdrawn  by  my  mother.  Every  winter  they 
distributed  cloth  to  make  the  boys  suits, 
"  lindsey-wolsey "  to  make  the  girls  frocks,  and 
flannel  for  underclothes  for  both  girls  and  boys. 

At  this  my  last  school  I  did  fairly  well  in 
arithmetic,  geography,  grammar  and  reading. 
When  I  stayed  at  the  school  during  lunch  and 
dinner  times,  as  I  often  did,  I  used  to  read  the 
books  intended  for  the  higher  standards,  if  I 
could  get  hold  of  them.  But  I  was  most  pro- 
ficient in  "Scripture  knowledge."  I  was  placed 
at  the  head  of  the  school,  and  held  up  as  an 
example  to  the  rest  on  account  of  my  theology, 
and  I  knew  practically  as  much  about  God  as  a 
field-mouse  knows  of  the  moon. 

At  this  school,  too,  I  composed  my  first  poem. 
It  ran  something  like  this,  but  as  I  am  quoting 
from  memory  I  will  not  vouch  for  its  accuracy — 

"A  ship  was  sailing  on  the  sea, 
The  sky  was  clear  and  light, 
And  old  de  Bourne  was  at  the  helm, 
His  face  was  glad  and  bright. 

Then  all  at  once  a  storm  arose, 

Which  swept  that  ship  away, 
And  what  became  of  old  de  Bourne 

I  '11  now  go  on  to  say. 


LATER  SCHOOLDAYS  35 

A  shark  was  lurking  down  below, 

A-looking  for  his  dinner, 
And  very  pleased  was  he  to  dine 

Upon  that  wicked  sinner." 

There  was  more  of  it,  but  this  is  all  I  recollect. 

In  addition  to  our  annual  school  treat,  a  con- 
cert in  the  school-room  in  the  winter,  and  our 
marches  out  with  the  band,  our  pleasures  con- 
sisted of  sliding  ("tobogganing")  down  the 
grassy  slopes  of  the  downs  on  pieces  of  board — 
a  very  exciting  pastime,  though  practically  safe 
when  the  slope  was  well  chosen.  There  are 
some  fine  slopes  above  Lower  Willingdon,  and 
the  pastime  can  be  enjoyed  almost  any  time  of 
the  year.  Indeed,  it  is  best  in  the  summer  when 
the  grass  is  dry  and  crisp,  and  the  air  scented 
with  wild  herbs.  There  were  also  the  recurring 
village  fair  and  club  feast.  "Maying,"  Guy 
Fawkes'  Day,  cricket  in  the  summer  and  sliding 
in  the  winter.  Of  these,  the  village  fair,  club 
feast  and  "Maying"  are  now  things  of  the  past. 
The  Guy  Fawkes'  celebrations,  with  their  torches, 
rockets  and  queer  fancy  costumes,  are  flickering 
out.  At  that  time  football  was  practically  un- 
known among  us;  but  cricket  was  the  great  thing. 
Most  of  the  boys  were  devoted  to  it,  and  have 
since,  some  of  them,  become  very  proficient. 
One,  Joe  Vine,  who  plays  for  Sussex,  has  achieved 
a  great  name.  I  have  always  taken  a  keen 


36  GEORGE  MEEK 

interest  in  our  county  cricket.  It  is  about  the 
only  form  of  sport  I  do  take  an  interest  in.  I  have 
been  hoping  for  years  to  see  Sussex  at  the  head  of 
the  counties,  but  I  am  getting  an  old  man  now, 
and  they  seem  as  far  off  as  ever.  Talking  of 
"the"  game,  I  once  wrote  some  verses  in  which  I 
prophesied  that  in  their  northern  tour  our  county 
would  beat  both  Yorkshire  and  Lancashire.  I 
sent  these  to  the  Clarion,  and  as  our  side  was  badly 
beaten  by  Yorks  at  Leeds,  Harry  Beswick  printed 
them,  with  a  very  caustic  comment.  However, 
as  Ranji  and  his  men  went  on  to  Old  Trafford  and 
gave  Lancashire  "what  for,"  "Bezique,"  who 
"wondered  what  Lanes  would  do  with  our  lot 
when  their  turn  came,"  did  n't  have  the  smile  all 
to  himself. 

Before  leaving  Willingdon,  I  must  speak  with 
the  highest  praise  of  the  vicar,  the  late  Canon 
Lowe.  I  was  too  young  to  form  an  opinion  of 
his  powers  as  a  preacher,  but  I  do  know  that  he 
used  to  lend  those  of  us  who  cared  to  have  them 
copies  of  The  Boys'  Own  Paper,  Young  England, 
Chatterbox  and  other  magazines,  and  he  would 
answer  any  questions  we  put  to  him  about  what 
we  had  been  reading.  He  was  a  white-haired, 
benevolent  old  gentleman.  He,  earlier  in  our  stay 
at  Willingdon,  procured  my  admission  to  the  Eye 
Infirmary,  Queen's  Road,  Brighton,  and  accom- 
panied me  and  my  mother  to  that  institution. 

This  was  the  first  time  I  had  ever  been  away 


LATER  SCHOOLDAYS  37 

from  home  for  any  length  of  time,  and  it  seemed 
very  strange  to  me.  There  were  four  or  five 
patients  beside  myself.  The  second  day  I  was 
there  I  underwent  an  operation,  without  anaes- 
thetics, part  of  the  iris  of  my  left  eye  being  re- 
moved, so  as  to  expose  more  of  the  surface  of  the 
pupil.  Ever  since  I  was  a  child  a  small  speck 
(called  an  "ulcera,"  I  believe)  has  obscured  the 
direct  vision  of  that  eye.  The  operation  was  fear- 
fully painful.  The  last  thing  I  saw  was  the 
lancet  descending.  Then  there  was  a  terrible 
pang  and  all  went  red.  I  shrieked,  but  as  I  was 
securely  strapped  down  to  the  operating  table  I 
could  not  move.  After  that  for  over  a  fortnight 
I  had  to  go  about  feeling  my  way  with  my  eye 
bandaged.  Although  we  had  plenty  of  good 
food,  I  could  eat  scarcely  anything,  and  was  very 
homesick.  When  the  bandages  were  removed 
I  found  that  objects  held  quite  close  to  my  eye 
became  out  of  focus.  It  is  so  still.  Their  out- 
lines become  blurred  and  indistinct.  The  bridge 
of  my  eye-glasses,  for  instance,  multiplies  itself 
so  many  times  that  it  looks  like  a  narrow  black 
cloud  through  which  I  can  see  other  objects. 
At  a  distance  I  can  see  quite  well,  and  have  no 
difficulty  whatever  in  getting  about,  though  I 
must  admit  I  should  be  sorry  to  undertake  to 
drive  a  motor. 

I   visited   Willingdon   this   week.     It   does  n't 
seem  greatly  changed,  except  that  the  passing 


38  GEORGE  MEEK 

motors  have  spoilt  the  appearance  of  the  roadside 
gardens  and  hedgerows.  I  have  not  been  to 
Jevington  for  a  long  while.  It  lies  in  a  secluded 
valley  off  the  main  road,  five  miles  by  a  footpath 
over  the  hills,  and  seven  miles  by  road  from 
Eastbourne.  Willingdon  is  only  about  two  and 
a  half  miles  on  the  main  road  to  Lewes,  Brighton 
and  London.  It  is  situated  on  a  spot  which  di- 
vides, not  "the  Desert  from  the  Sown,"  but  the 
beautiful  old  Downs,  with  their  wide,  open 
spaces,  from  the  cultivated  Weald. 

When  I  was  twelve  years  old,  my  mother 
having  made  the  acquaintance  of  a  country 
butcher  who  had  turned  cabman  in  Eastbourne, 
we  went  to  live  together  in  that  town,  leaving 
my  grandmother  and  cousin  Harry  behind  in  the 
village. 


CHAPTER  IV 

GOING  TO  WORK 

THE  butcher-cabman  would  have  married  my 
mother,  but  as  he  had  a  wife  still  living  it  was 
out  of  the  question.  In  his  younger  days  he 
had  been  a  thoroughly  bad  lot,  a  drunkard, 
whose  cruelties  drove  his  wife  away  from  him. 
When  he  met  my  mother  he  had  been  a  teetotaler 
for  some  years,  and,  I  believe,  remained  so  till 
his  death.  He  treated  her  well  until  she  died. 
She  could  not  remain  in  Willingdon  because  she 
was  already  expecting  a  child  and  she  was  ashamed 
of  that  fact. 

We  occupied  two  unfurnished  rooms  in  Susan's 
Road  for  a  time.  Here  my  mother  continued 
to  do  a  little  dressmaking.  Directly  we  arrived 
in  the  town  I  set  out  in  search  of  employment. 
It  being  August  and  the  height  of  the  season, 
I  obtained  a  situation  at  once  with  a  Mr.  Gilbert, 
a  local  baker,  as  errand  boy.  Here  I  remained 
only  four  days.  Being  fragile  (I  was  just  turned 
twelve)  I  found  the  baskets  of  bread  heavy  to 
carry,  I  did  not  know  my  way  about  the  town, 

39 


40  GEORGE  MEEK 

and  I  expect  the  shop  windows  formed  an  irre- 
sistible attraction  to  the  boy  fresh  from  the 
country.  Also  my  mother  had  provided  me 
with  a  new  pair  of  boots  which  were  much  too 
small  for  me.  Anyway,  I  was  gone  too  long  on  my 
errands  and  thus  quickly  earned  the  order  of  the 
sack.  Then  I  obtained  work  with  George  Vine, 
who  kept  a  baker's  shop  in  Pevensey  Road. 
There  were  several  boys  employed  there.  Our 
duties  consisted  in  selling  hot  rolls  in  the  early 
morning,  buns  and  tarts  on  the  beach  later  in  the 
day,  and  we  filled  up  our  time  by  delivering  bread, 
running  errands  and  washing  up  and  cleaning 
tins  and  other  utensils  used  in  the  bakehouse. 
I  stayed  at  this  place  some  time.  I  was  there  at 
the  time  of  the  great  blizzard  in  January,  '81, 
when  I  had  to  wait  outside  of  the  bakehouse  door 
in  the  snow,  because  if  it  had  been  opened  to 
admit  me  it  would  have  spoilt  the  "batch"  of 
bread. 

On  February  14  the  same  year,  my  sister  Kate 
was  born.  Joe  and  Arthur,  my  two  younger 
brothers,  aged  respectively  eight  and  four,  were 
sent  to  a  private  school  of  the  "dame"  variety, 
at  which  the  fee  was  sixpence  per  week  per  child. 
My  own  treatment  at  home  was  very  harsh. 
Although  I  boarded  with  the  baker  for  whom  I 
worked  I  had  to  give  up  all  my  wages.  Some- 
times my  mother  would  give  me  a  penny  on 
Sundays,  but  that  was  all.  After  a  time,  grow- 


GOING  TO  WORK  41 

ing  sick  of  it  all,  and  full  of  dreams  of  an  inde- 
pendent career,  I  ran  away  to  Hastings,  where 
my  cousin  Harry  had  at  that  time  gone  to  work; 
but  the  police  promptly  sent  me  back  home.  As 
I  had  spent  all  my  wages  I  received  a  cruel  thrash- 
ing, which  implanted  a  deep  hatred  in  me  against 
the  cabman  who  gave  it  me  and  my  mother  who 
authorized  it. 

Then  followed  many  other  situations — one  at 
the  Gazette  office,  where  I  had  to  clean  printing 
rollers  and  hawk  newspapers.  I  was  never  good 
at  hawking  anything,  and  I  did  not  make  a 
successful  newsboy.  Chemists,  grocers,  drapers, 
book-shops  followed.  If  I  liked  a  place  and 
tried  hard  to  keep  it  I  was  certain  to  get  dis- 
charged; if  I  didn't  like  it  and  didn't  worry  I 
was  usually  kept  on.  I  read  a  great  deal  when 
I  had  the  chance,  my  favourite  paper  being 
Henderson's  Young  Folks.  It  had,  I  believe, 
been  called  Young  Folks1  Budget,  and  after- 
wards appeared  as  Young  Folks'  Paper.  Any- 
way, it  was,  in  spite  of  the  extravagance  of  some 
of  its  stories,  superior  to  most  juvenile  publica- 
tions of  that  day.  I  wonder  if  any  of  my  readers 
remember  Don  Zalva  the  Brave,  who  met  with 
more  exciting  adventures  in  a  week  than  the  Cid 
encountered  in  his  whole  life!  or  Ralpho  the 
Fearless,  the  Young  Swordsman  of  Warsaw,  whose 
truly  wonderful  history  inspired  our  young  hearts 
with  undying  hatred  of  Russian  tyranny  and  pity 


42 

for  poor  fallen  Poland!  But  besides  these  ex- 
travagant romances  there  were  some  really  good 
stories  imported  from  America,  to  say  nothing  of 
Treasure  Island,  Kidnapped  and  The  Black  Arrow 
by  the  late  R.  L.  Stevenson.  I  very  much 
preferred  Young  Folks  to  the  baser  kind  of  boys' 
paper  which  was  so  prevalent  at  that  time.  I 
have  no  doubt  but  that  such  demoralizing  rub- 
bish as  was  served  up  in  The  Boys  of  London  and 
New  York  and  the  Young  Men(?~)  of  Great  Britain, 
and  such  like  publications  paved  the  way  for  the 
existence  of  our  more  disreputable  daily  press. 
I  have  read  Mr.  Wells's  Tono-Bungay  since  writing 
the  foregoing,  but  I  still  think  the  "Penny  Dread- 
fuls" of  that  period  an  unmixed  evil. 

I  did  not  tire  of  Young  Folks  for  a  good  many 
years.  I  have  always  liked  to  have  at  least  one 
paper  in  which  to  take  a  keen  interest.  After 
Young  Folks,  while  I  was  under  the  religious 
influence,  it  was  the  Gospel  Standard,  then  the 
Clarion,  which  made  Friday  a  red-letter  day 
every  week  for  years;  now  the  New  Age,  the 
Clarion  still,  the  Woman  Worker,  since  Julia 
Dawson  has  occupied  the  editorial  chair,  and 
the  Sunday  Chronicle. 

After  a  time,  my  home  life  growing  more  and 
more  intolerable  to  me,  I  ran  away  again.  This 
time,  instead  of  going  to  Hastings,  I  made  a 
bee-line,  as  near  as  I  could,  towards  Brighton, 
going  over  the  hills.  After  passing  through 


GOING  TO  WORK  43 

East  Dean  and  Friston  I  made  for  the  cliffs,  for- 
getting that  I  should  have  to  cross  the  little  river 
Cuckmere,  of  whose  existence  I  was  certainly 
aware  when  I  was  at  school  as,  being  told  by 
the  teacher  to  draw  a  map  of  Sussex  on  the  black- 
board one  day,  I  included  that  river  in  it,  fairly 
accurately  indicating  its  course,  much  to  his 
surprise,  as  it  was  not  given  in  our  school  maps 
of  the  county.  As  it  happened,  however,  a 
postman  was  crossing  when  I  came  to  it,  and 
he  very  kindly  ferried  me  over.  It  seemed  to 
me  then,  and  I  have  often  thought  since,  that 
this  spot — where  the  Cuckmere  falls,  or  rather 
wanders,  into  the  sea — would  make  an  ideal  site 
for  a  small  seaside  town.  It  has  a  southerly 
aspect  and  is  sheltered  from  the  north-east  and 
east  by  Beachy  Head  and  the  intervening  "Seven 
Sisters,"  and  from  the  north-west  by  other 
downs.  Indeed,  it  is  a  great  pity  that  East- 
bourne itself  does  not  stand  to  the  west  rather 
than  the  east  of  Beachy  Head. 

The  postman  charged  me  nothing  for  giving 
me  a  lift  in  his  boat,  which  was  fortunate,  as  I 
was  penniless.  On  reaching  the  farther  bank  I 
walked  on  some  distance,  when  I  came  to  a 
large  building  where  there  were  several  forges 
in  full  blast.  Here  I  inquired  my  way  to  Sea- 
ford,  which  I  knew  to  be  the  next  town  on  my 
road.  It  was  quite  dark,  so  I  suppose  the  smiths 
were  working  overtime,  or  else  a  night-shift. 


44  GEORGE  MEEK 

They  asked  me  what  I  was  going  to  Seaford  for; 
I  told  them  to  look  for  work.  They  directed 
me,  and  made  a  collection  for  me  which  amounted 
to  over  five  shillings.  But  they  did  n't  offer  me 
a  job.  That  night  I  slept  upon  a  pile  of  iron 
pipes  beside  a  watchman's  fire  in  Seaford.  The 
next  morning  I  walked  the  few  miles  into  New- 
haven,  where  I  wandered  about  the  harbour  and 
the  town.  Failing  to  see  or  hear  of  a  "Boy 
Wanted"  anywhere  I  foolishly  spent  my  money 
on  a  ticket  to  New  Cross.  I  thought  I  should  be 
certain  to  succeed  in  London. 

I  had,  perhaps,  a  penny  or  twopence  left  when 
I  reached  town.  I  wandered  about  the  rest  of 
the  day,  still  looking  for  work.  Tired  and  foot- 
sore, I  found  myself  on  London  Bridge  at  night, 
and  sitting  down  in  one  of  the  old  alcoves  I  fell 
asleep.  Presently  I  awoke  with  a  glare  in  my 
eyes,  to  find  myself  surrounded  by  a  small  crowd 
with  a  policeman  standing  over  and  shaking  me. 
I  told  them  my  father  and  mother  were  dead  and 
I  had  come  to  London  to  look  for  work.  I  sup- 
pose, dressed  as  I  was  in  a  black  velveteen  jacket 
and  white  cord  trousers,  I  looked  a  strange  sight 
to  them.  Anyway,  the  policeman  let  me  go, 
and  the  people  gave  me  enough  money  to  buy  a 
supper  and  pay  for  a  bed. 

The  next  day  I  tramped  about  London  look- 
ing for  work  without  success.  At  night  some 
fishmongers  in  a  shop  under  one  of  the  arch- 


GOING  TO  WORK  45 

ways  at  Ludgate  Hill  Station  gave  me  some 
food  and  paid  for  my  lodging.  The  next  day 
they  directed  me  to  a  boys'  home  in  Clapham 
Road.  I  do  not  recollect  much  of  my  reception 
there  or  what  I  thought  of  the  place.  The  next 
day  I  was  sent  out  with  a  shoe-black's  box  to 
stand  under  the  archway  at  Clapham  Road 
Station.  Then  I  was  employed  scrubbing  and 
cleaning  in  the  house  for  nearly  a  fortnight. 
The  boys  there  seemed  to  me  a  very  decent,  well- 
behaved  lot,  except  one,  an  inveterate  bully,  who 
was  always  tormenting  the  weaker  ones.  I  stood 
his  bullying  till  I  found  it  wearisome,  then  I  hit 
him  over  the  head  with  a  thick  stick,  cutting  it 
open  and  sending  him  howling  to  the  superin- 
tendent. I  had  given  this  superintendent  my 
mother's  name  and  address,  thinking,  as  she 
was  always  finding  fault  with  me,  she  would  be 
glad  to  let  me  stay  in  the  home.  However, 
she  was  not,  apparently,  for  I  was  sent  back  to 
Eastbourne. 

More  situations  followed  my  return,  but  the 
next  year  I  made  my  final  bolt — this  time  into 
the  country.  When  we  moved  into  Eastbourne 
in  1880  I  was  twelve  years  old.  At  the  time  of 
my  final  exit  from  home  I  was  fifteen.  Though 
I  have  seen  much  sorrow  since,  those  three  years 
were  decidedly  the  most  unhappy  I  have  ever 
lived  through.  If  my  mother  ever  gave  me  a 
kind  word  I  do  not  remember  it:  I  am  sure  she 


46  GEORGE  MEEK 

never  gave  me  an  affectionate  one.  While  she 
always  treated  me  badly  and  petted  my  younger 
brothers  and  our  little  sister,  I  was  very  fond  of 
them  all  three.  When  I  left  home  Joe,  the  elder, 
was  nearly  eleven,  Arthur  a  chubby  little  chap 
of  seven,  and  Kate  a  little  golden-haired  fairy 
of  three. 

As  I  remember,  I  used  sometimes  to  have  to 
do  very  hard  and  even  dangerous  work — push- 
ing heavy  tradesmen's  trucks,  carrying  heavy 
loads,  and  standing  outside  second-  or  third- 
storey  windows  to  clean  them.  But  while  all 
my  money  was  taken  from  me  I  was  badly  fed 
and  clothed.  Once  I  was  at  work  for  a  well-to-do 
tradesman  in  Terminus  Road;  he  was  exceed- 
ingly religious,  so  much  so  that  he  would  not 
allow  his  children  to  go  to  Christmas  parties. 
One  day  he  set  me  to  clean  out  the  space  in 
front  of  the  cellar  window  which  was  covered 
by  an  iron  grating  in  the  pavement  in  front  of 
his  shop  window.  Here  I  found  about  f ourpence 
three-farthings  in  coppers,  and  got  into  trouble 
because  I  stuck  to  it!  He  was  a  preacher  for 
one  of  the  obscure  sects  which  drone  their  mono- 
tonous dirges  (you  can't  call  them  "hymns")  in 
various  holes  and  corners  about  the  town. 

I  had  few,  if  any,  pleasures  besides  my  read- 
ing. On  Sunday  I  attended  the  Congregational 
School,  where  I  was  in  Mr.  Cripps'  class.  The 
annual  outing,  usually  at  Pevensey  Castle,  used 


GOING  TO  WORK  47 

to  break  the  monotony  of  the  year.  There,  for 
one  day,  one  could  be  a  child  and  play  again. 
Apart  from  these  great  days  and  Mr.  Cripps' 
kindness  to  me,  I  remember  little  of  the  school, 
except  that  when,  after  early  lessons,  the  scholars 
filled  the  centre  of  the  large  school-room  to  listen 
to  the  superintendent's  address,  the  boys  down 
one  side,  the  girls  down  the  other,  the  elder  boys 
who  sat  near  the  girls  would  point  out  the  am- 
biguous stories  and  passages  in  the  Bible  to 
them,  and  they  did  n't  seem  to  mind.  Of  this 
school  the  late  Mr.  Neville  Strange  wa.s  super- 
intendent, and  one  of  the  teachers  was  a  Mr. 
Leonard  who  has  since  been  very  active  in  the 
Socialist  movement  in  the  North. 

During  this  period  I  first  learned  to  smoke. 
After  my  first  attempt,  which,  although  it  made 
me  feel  giddy,  did  not  make  me  sick,  I  took  to 
it  naturally,  and  I  have  been  devoted  to  my  pipe 
ever  since.  I  made  no  friends,  except  the  sons 
of  a  baker  whom  I  sometimes  helped  when  I  had 
no  other  work,  in  return  for  a  few  coppers.  These 
became  very  good  friends,  and  employed  me 
regularly  when  I  afterwards  returned  to  East- 
bourne. Most  of  the  boys  I  got  to  know  through 
working  with  them  were  too  filthy  in  their  habits 
and  conversation  to  suit  me,  and  I  made  no  girl 
friends;  I  was  usually  very  badly  dressed,  and 
unless  I  made  a  few  coppers  unknown  to  my 
mother  I  never  had  any  pocket  money.  And  I 


48  GEORGE  MEEK 

was  naturally  very  shy.  I  buried  myself  as  much 
as  I  could  in  my  reading  and  my  day-dreams  to 
escape  the  irksome  realities  of  my  everyday  life. 
Unless  trouble  was  very  acute  and  pressing  I 
could  nearly  always  withdraw  my  mind  from 
my  environment  into  a  land  of  dreams — a  land 
which  was  my  very  own,  where  great  and  glorious 
things  happened.  This  faculty  I  have  enjoyed 
ever  since  I  can  remember,  though  of  late  years 
I  find  it  less  easy  to  detach  myself  from  my  sur- 
roundings, and  the  visions  I  see  are  less  vivid. 
I  suffered  very  much  from  toothache ;  it  was  this, 
I  think,  which  led  me  to  smoke,  because  the 
tobacco  deadened  the  pain. 


CHAPTER  V 

COUNTRY  AND  TOWN 

IN  the  summer  of  1883  my  mother  was  taken 
ill  with  consumption.  I  was  out  of  employment 
at  the  time,  and  though  I  did  my  best  by  trying 
to  keep  the  house  clean  for  her  and  helping  to 
cook  the  meals,  she  became  more  irritable  with 
me  than  ever.  One  night  towards  the  end  of 
August,  having  been  out  looking  for  work  with- 
out finding  any,  and  coming  home  to  a  flood  of 
abuse  and  no  supper,  I  quietly  walked  out  again 
and  took  to  the  road. 

I  walked  to  Stone's  Cross  that  night.  I  met 
some  lads  from  the  Gazette  office  on  the  way, 
who  gave  me,  I  believe,  some  food  and  coppers, 
and  directed  me  to  an  empty  house  in  which  to 
sleep.  This  cottage  was  about  to  be  demolished. 
Its  windows  had  been  taken  out,  and  sleeping  on 
the  bare  boards  in  an  upper  room,  I  found  it 
anything  but  cheerful.  Early  the  next  morning 
I  was  astir,  and  had  reached  Heathfield  soon 
after  eight.  Now  I  come  to  think  of  it,  I  fancy 
the  lads  from  the  Gazette  office  must  have  given 

4  49 


50  GEORGE  MEEK 

me  at  least  a  shilling,  for  I  had  enough  money 
to  get  some  breakfast  at  Heathfield,  and  food 
during  the  rest  of  the  day  at  Mayfield  and  Rother- 
field.  After  a  long,  lonely  uphill  walk  through 
Eridge  Park,  I  reached  Tunbridge  Wells  late  in 
the  afternoon.  Here  I  had  a  look  round  for  a 
job,  then  some  supper  and  a  bed  at  a  common 
lodging-house.  It  being  nearly  the  end  of  August 
this  place  was  full  of  hop-pickers  on  their  way  to 
the  gardens.  Among  them  was  a  little  old  shoe- 
maker from  Chelsea,  whose  acquaintance  I  made. 
He  advised  me  not  to  go  into  Kent,  but  to  ac- 
company him  to  a  place  he  knew  of  near  Wadhurst, 
which  I  did.  We  started  early  the  next  morning 
through  a  drizzly  rain,  eating  blackberries  we 
picked  from  the  hedgerows  to  eke  out  our  scanty 
provisions.  Arrived  at  the  farm,  we  were  engaged, 
and  given  an  open  cattle  shed  in  which  to  sleep 
among  the  straw.  The  next  day  we  started 
operations ;  we  had  a  bin  between  us,  and  were  paid 
at  the  rate  of  twopence  a  bushel  for  picking  the 
hops,  which  were  very  small.  A  small  shopkeeper 
let  us  have  some  bread,  onions  and  other  provisions 
on  credit,  and  the  people  at  a  cottage  "windfall" 
apples  at  a  penny  a  gallon.  Bread-and-butter 
and  tea  for  breakfast  and  supper,  and  bread-and- 
cheese,  with  onions  or  apples,  for  dinner,  with  a 
rasher  or  piece  of  steak  fried  over  a  gipsy  fire 
for  a  change  on  Sundays,  formed  our  diet,  and 
I  doubt  if  I  ever  enjoyed  anything  more  heartily. 


COUNTRY  AND  TOWN  51 

The  people  at  this  first  farm  were  very  quiet  and 
respectable.  We  had  a  fortnight  there,  when  we 
went  to  another  at  Mayfield,  where  we  had 
another  fortnight.  Here  the  pickers  were  a 
rough  lot  from  the  purlieus  of  Edward  Street, 
Brighton,  and  there  was  a  good  deal  of  drinking, 
fighting,  and  worse,  going  on,  especially  on 
Saturday  nights.  It  was  a  month's  rare  fun  for 
me,  however.  There  was  no  one  to  nag  at  me, 
and  I  earned  ten  or  twelve  shillings  a  week,  which 
I  did  what  I  liked  with,  as  I  had  it  all  myself. 

When  we  finished  up  at  the  farm  we  had  a 
good  dinner  of  steak  and  fried  onions  at  May- 
field,  and  then,  instead  of  trusting  to  our  feet, 
very  foolishly  paid  our  rail  fare  to  Tunbridge 
Wells.  Here  my  companion  left  me,  to  go  on 
the  drunk.  The  lodging-houses  were  all  full  on 
account  of  the  returning  hoppers,  so  at  last  a 
friendly  policeman  persuaded  a  lodging-house 
keeper  to  let  me  sleep  in  their  best  bedroom.  I 
woke  up  feeling  bad  with  a  heavy  cold,  but 
tramped  through  the  rain  to  Sevenoaks,  where  I 
picked  up  with  a  poor  shiftless  sort  of  a  chap 
who  was  also  tramping  to  London,  where  I  had 
made  up  my  mind  to  again  try  my  luck,  calling 
at  every  baker's  shop  I  came  to  to  see  if  I  could 
get  work.  I  had  worked  mostly  in  bakehouses. 
If  they  could  not  give  me  work — and  they  never 
could  or  at  least  never  did — and  I  was  hungry,  I 
asked  them  to  give  me  a  piece  of  bread.  I  never 


52  GEORGE  MEEK 

had  the  courage  to  beg  at  a  private  house,  or  else 
my  pride  would  not  let  me.  But  I  knew  if  the 
bakers  cared  to  employ  me  I  was  more  than 
willing  to  work  and  could  make  myself  useful 
to  them. 

At  last  we  came  to  Woolwich.  Here  we  were 
both  "broke,"  and  it  was  raining,  so  we  made 
use  of  the  casual  ward. 

Personally,  I  do  not  believe  in  the  traditional 
hell,  but  there  ought  to  be  one  with  a  very  hot 
place  indeed  for  those  who  invented,  administer 
and  perpetuate  the  casual  ward.  It  is  cruel  and 
inhuman;  it  is  worse  than  prison.  "The  spike" 
is  too  mild  a  name  for  it. 

The  next  day  I  had  four  pounds  of  oakum  to 
pick,  but  I  did  n't  pick  all  of  it.  They  let  me  off 
the  following  day,  however,  as  I  had  never  been 
there  before,  and  I  have  never  been  inside  a 
casual  ward  since.  I  would  rather  do  something 
to  get  myself  locked  up.  I  did  n't  mind  the  bath. 
I  needed  it,  and  my  clothes  must  have  been  in  a 
bad  state  through  sleeping  out.  But  I  did  object 
to  the  plank  bed,  with  only  two  coarse  rugs,  the 
bread  and  "skilly"  for  breakfast  and  supper,  the 
bread  and  cheese  and  water  for  dinner,  the  lone- 
liness of  the  cell  night  and  day,  but  most  of  all 
to  the  brutal  manner  of  the  officials. 

That  day  I  spent  trying  the  bakers'  shops 
or  the  "Boy  Wanted"  notices  for  work  in  vain. 
The  night,  though  I  was  not  hungry,  I  passed 


COUNTRY  AND  TOWN  53 

wretchedly  by  walking  about  the  streets.  The 
next  morning,  being  down  Whitechapel  way,  a 
friendly  policeman  directed  me  to  apply  at  a  Home 
near  Charrington's  Brewery,  Mile  End  Road — that 
of  the  "Tower  Hamlets  Shoeblack  Brigade." 
They  took  me  in  and  set  me  to  work  cleaning. 
Then  after  a  day  or  two  they  sent  me  out  with  a 
shoeblack  box.  This  was  my  first,  but  not  last, 
experience  of  the  life  of  sorrow  which  depends 
upon  casual  employment.  I  left  this  Home  after 
a  week  or  two  to  go  to  another  in  Limehouse  which 
was  connected  with  Dr.  Barnado's.  Here  I  stayed 
till  the  following  May,  when  a  longing  to  return 
home  seized  me,  and  I  left  it  for  Eastbourne. 

I  do  not  know  if  the  same  conditions  obtain 
in  these  Homes  now.  We  went  out  with  our 
boxes  every  morning,  and  had  to  ''pay  in"  so 
much  at  night  for  our  stands.  The  sum  varied 
according  to  the  stand.  Thus  one  paid  more  for 
the  pitch  at  Stepney  Station  than  the  Burdett 
Road  one.  My  "pitches"  were  Burdett  Road, 
Canning  Town  Station,  and  the  "Great  Eastern" 
at  the  corner  of  the  East  and  West  India  Dock 
Roads.  If  we  did  not  "book  in"  the  money 
they  charged  they  used  to  threaten  to  turn  us 
out.  Besides  our  beds  and  boxes,  they  gave  us, 
I  believe,  tea  and  bread-and-butter  for  breakfast 
on  Sundays.  I  forget  about  the  rest  of  the 
week,  except  that  we  always  had  to  buy  our  own 
dinners.  I  do  not  think,  on  the  whole,  we  fared 


54  GEORGE  MEEK 

so  badly.  I  liked  most  of  the  boys,  and  they 
treated  me  well.  I  liked,  too,  the  bustle  and  life 
of  the  streets.  I  was  deeply  interested  in  the 
strange  faces  and  dresses  of  the  Asiatic  sailors  in 
the  West  India  Dock  Road. 

We  were  marched  on  Sunday  mornings  to 
Limehouse  Church.  The  rest  of  the  day  we  had 
to  ourselves.  I  used  to  spend  the  afternoons 
as  a  rule  walking  round  the  docks  looking  at  the 
shipping.  Once  or  twice  when  I  had  had  a  good 
day  I  took  a  night  off  and  went  to  a  music-hall  or 
theatre.  I  was  at  "Lusby's" — now  the  "Para- 
gon," Mile  End  Road — the  night  before  it  was 
burnt  down.  My  first  experience  of  the  theatre 
was  at  the  Pavilion,  Whitechapel.  On  these  occa- 
sions I  climbed  over  the  area  railings  and  slept  in 
the  coal-cellar,  giving  as  an  excuse  the  next  morning 
that  I  had  been  to  Islington  or  some  other  distant 
part  after  a  job.  I  always  got  off  with  a  scold- 
ing. I  met  with  no  serious  trouble  while  I  was 
there. 

Part  of  the  time  I  was  employed  delivering 
circulars  and  carrying  sandwich-boards.  With 
one  pair  of  the  latter  I  wandered  for  some  weeks 
about  the  streets  of  Stepney  and  Mile  End. 
Other  times  I  was  employed  scrubbing  and 
cleaning  about  the  house.  One  day,  while  so 
employed,  I  tried  to  ride  an  old  "ordinary"  bike 
belonging  to  the  master,  Mr.  Hawkins,  round 
the  back  yard.  The  back  wheel  came  off,  throw- 


COUNTRY  AND  TOWN  55 

ing  me  over  on  my  head.  As  I  remember  him, 
this  Mr.  Hawkins  was  not  at  all  bad  to  the  boys. 
We  enjoyed  a  great  amount  of  liberty — more 
than  boys  are  usually  given  in  such  places,  and 
far  more  than  they  would  get  in  the  workhouse, 
and  it  must  be  remembered  that  liberty  is  just 
as  dear  to  the  lad  of  fourteen  or  fifteen  as  it  is  to 
the  man  of  forty  or  fifty.  Of  course,  we  were 
taught  nothing.  The  Home  was,  I  believe,  re- 
garded as  a  temporary  shelter  for  lads  who  were 
too  old  for  the  Stepney  Causeway  Homes — bar- 
rack-like places  we  regarded  with  more  or  less 
contempt — and  too  young  for  the  Youths'  Labour 
Home  in  Commercial  Road.  The  latter  place 
has  been  provided  for  older  lads,  who  are  event- 
ually drafted  to  the  Grimsby  or  Yarmouth  fishing 
fleet  or  sent  to  Canada,  where  many  of  them  have 
done  very  well. 

None  of  these  institutions  deals  really  adequately 
with  the  homeless  boy.  Some  of  them  are  really 
nothing  but  private  workhouses  maintained  by 
voluntary  subscriptions,  in  which  the  inmates 
are  so  many  little  slaves  and  prisoners,  treated 
approximately  like  convicts.  That  they  exist  at 
all  is  owing  to  the  fact  that  they  provide  well- 
paid  berths  for  a  few  officials.  I  know  that  one 
of  the  founders  of  such  an  institution,  having 
failed  in  his  profession,  started  a  "Boys'  Home" 
without  a  half -penny  of  his  own  to  bless  himself 
with.  Being  a  fluent  ranter,  and  possessing 


56  GEORGE  MEEK 

some  business  ability,  he  built  up  a  great  con- 
cern, and  long  before  his  death  was  able  to  take 
expensive  apartments  in  the  most  fashionable 
part  of  Eastbourne  for  himself  and  family  for 
their  summer  holidays. 

Some  of  the  "Homes" — especially  the  shoe- 
black variety — are  simply  run  to  exploit  the  poor 
boys  who  are  driven  into  them.  I  had  some 
experience  of  two  of  these  places,  besides  the 
"Union  Jack"  in  Limehouse.  One  was  near 
the  Mile  End  Road,  the  other  in  Leman  Street, 
from  both  of  which  I  was  turned  into  the  street 
because  I  failed  to  earn  the  stipulated  sum  to 
pay  for  box,  bed,  breakfast  and  supper.  To  the 
Leman  Street  "Home"  I  had  to  pay  tenpence 
per  day  for  a  pitch  in  a  draughty  passage  in 
Fenchurch  Street,  where,  if  I  remember  rightly, 
I  earned  less  than  sixpence. 

At  the  same  time,  these  places  offer  a  refuge 
for  the  homeless  lad  who  has  a  very  proper  scorn 
and  dread  of  the  provision  made  for  him  by  his 
hard  foster-mother  the  State  in  the  workhouse. 
No  doubt  many  boys,  sharper  and  more  fortunate 
than  I,  have,  making  these  places  stepping-stones 
to  better  things,  been  saved  from  lives  of  degrada- 
tion and  crime.  Whatever  their  failings,  they 
leave  the  boy  a  great  amount  of  liberty  to  develop 
his  individuality  in  his  own  way,  and  to  use  his 
initiative  when  opportunity  occurs. 

There  were  boys  of  every  description  in  the 


57 

one  at  Limehouse,  in  which  I  spent  nine  months 
— mostly  healthy,  clean-minded,  "manly"  boys; 
and  though  those  who  wanted  to  used  to  smoke 
when  they  had  the  chance,  and  one  or  two  of  the 
bolder  spirits  occasionally  rose  to  the  enormity 
of  a  glass  of  "four  ale,"  I  do  not  remember  that 
any  of  them  abused  their  freedom. 

Before  leaving  these  London  experiences,  there 
is  one  incident  I  must  record  with  pleasure  and 
gratitude  to  the  stranger  who  figures  in  it.  I 
was  standing  outside  an  A.  B.  C.  shop  in  Lud- 
gate  Circus  one  night,  homeless  and  penniless, 
gazing  wistfully  at  the  food  in  the  window,  for 
I  was  very  hungry.  While  I  was  doing  so  a 
young  man  came  up  to  me  and  asked  me  if  I 
was  hungry.  "I  am  that!"  I  said.  He  gave  me 
sixpence,  which  bought  me  supper  and  paid  for 
a  night's  lodging.  He  went  his  way,  and  pro- 
bably forgot  his  kind  impulse  in  a  little  while.  I 
wish  I  could  see  him  now  that  I  have  some  power 
of  self-expression  to  tell  him  what  his  sixpence 
meant  to  me.  It  was  so  much  more  than  six- 
pence. Whoever  he  was,  I  hope  fate  has  dealt 
kindly  with  him. 

I  am  not  certain  whether  it  was  during  my  stay 
in  London  this  time,  or  later,  but  I  fancy  it  was 
later,  that  I  used  to  see  William  Morris  address- 
ing the  Socialist  meetings  at  the  Dodd  Street 
end  of  Burdett  Road.  If  I  had  only  known! 
but  I  was  at  the  time  under  the  influence  of  some 


58  GEORGE  MEEK 

revivalists,  and  we  used  to  walk,  like  the  priest 
and  Levite,  on  the  other  side.  This  is  a  digres- 
sion, but  digressions  are  inevitable,  because  I 
am  not  writing  a  romance  in  which  the  incidents 
are  all  cut  and  dried,  and  their  orderly  narration 
inevitable.  I  am  trying,  in  spite  of  my  imperfect 
gifts  and  my  limited  experience  in  the  art  of 
writing,  to  set  down  a  human  life  for  you. 

Then  the  spring  came,  with  May  sunshine  and 
the  call  of  the  fields  and  country  lanes.  Besides, 
I  had  not  written  to  or  received  a  letter  from 
Eastbourne,  and  I  wondered  how  they  were  all 
getting  on.  I  told  Mr.  Hawkins  I  thought  I 
should  like  to  go  back  home  and  try  for  work 
at  the  baking.  To  my  surprise,  I  found  there 
was  eight  and  sixpence  due  to  me — possibly  part 
payment  for  the  scrubbing,  sandwich-boards  or 
bill-distributing.  At  all  events,  I  was  glad  of  it. 
If  I  remember  rightly,  both  Mr.  Hawkins  and 
the  boys  were  sorry  to  lose  me. 


CHAPTER  VI 

BACK    TO  EASTBOURNE 

MY  eight  and  sixpence  carried  me  nicely  to 
Eastbourne.  I  was  not  so  foolish  as  to  take  a 
ticket  direct.  For  one  thing,  I  wanted  a  quiet 
walk  in  the  country  where  I  could  think:  from 
London  to  Eastbourne  without  an  hour  or  two's 
reflection  seemed  out  of  the  question.  Besides, 
I  wanted  to  have  as  much  money  as  possible 
when  I  got  there  as,  perhaps,  a  peace  offering,  or 
at  any  rate  to  stand  by  me  a  day  or  two.  But 
I  wanted  to  get  well  away  from  London  at  once, 
so  I  enriched  the  London,  Brighton  &  South 
Coast  Railway  to  the  extent  of  the  price  of  a 
third-class  ticket  to  Croydon,  whence  I  jogged 
merrily  along  to  Cuckfield  where  I  put  up  for 
the  night  at  a  roadside  inn.  Though  I  must 
have  been  very  tired  indeed  I  could  not  sleep 
for  a  long  time  on  account  of  the  perfect  still- 
ness. For  nine  months  in  the  Home  at  Lime- 
house  I  had  slept  soundly  with  the  clang  of 
tram-car  bells  in  my  ears  till  midnight  and  the 
rumble  of  passing  dock  trains  every  few  minutes 

59 


60  GEORGE  MEEK 

all  night  long  (the  Home  stands  within  a  few 
yards  of  a  branch  line  of  the  Great  Eastern 
Railway),  and  the  sudden  change  from  din  to 
absolute  quiet  was  not  conducive  to  early  repose. 
However,  I  slept  at  last,  and  rising  in  the  morn- 
ing had  a  good  wash  out  in  the  fresh  country  air 
and  walked  to  Lewes,  from  which  I  took  train  to 
Polegate. 

My  grandmother  and  an  aunt  and  uncle  still 
lived  at  Willingdon.  I  went  to  my  aunt's,  and 
she  told  me  my  mother  was  dead.  My  grand- 
mother was  sent  for,  and  burst  into  tears  on  see- 
ing me.  It  seems  all  sorts  of  tales  had  got  afloat 
about  me:  I  had  been  in  prison,  been  killed,  and 
I  don't  know  what  else.  From  Willingdon  I 
walked  into  Eastbourne  to  look  up  my  old  friends 
the  Strettons,  the  people  who  kept  the  baker's 
shop,  whose  sons  were  good  to  me.  I  found 
Ernest,  one  of  them,  washing  the  pavement  down 
in  front  of  his  aunt's  house  in  High  Street.  I 
went  home  with  him  and  they  gave  me  some  tea 
and  asked  me  to  look  round  at  the  bakehouse 
on  the  Monday  morning.  I  returned  to  East- 
bourne on  a  Saturday.  Then  I  went  to  our  old 
home  in  Susan's  Road,  where  I  found  our  lodgers — 
a  plasterer  turned  bathchair-man  and  his  wife — 
had  taken  the  house  and  that  the  cabman  had  a 
room  with  them.  I  saw  my  little  sister,  whom 
they  were  caring  for,  and  learned  that  my  brothers 
had  been  sent  to  the  workhouse.  I  saw  Joe  once 


BACK  TO  EASTBOURNE         61 

afterwards,  just  before  he  was  going  away  to  a 
Home  at  Melton  Bryan  in  Bedfordshire,  and  it 
made  my  heart  ache  to  see  the  little  chap  in  his 
workhouse  uniform.  He  cried  bitterly  on  seeing 
me,  and  oh !  how  deeply  I  grieved  to  think  I  could 
not  take  him  and  Arthur  out  of  the  loathed  bastile 
and  care  for  them  myself!  I  never  saw  Arthur 
again.  They  were  both  eventually  sent  to  Canada, 
and  I  am  glad  to  say  are  doing  well,  Joe  being  in 
steady  employment  at  good  wages  near  Seattle 
and  Arthur  being  "depot  agent"  at  Sandridge, 
Minn.,  on  the  Great  North  Railway. 

I  put  up  at  the  Rising  Sun,  Seaside,  that  night 
and  during  the  next  week.  On  the  Sunday 
I  saw  the  cabman,  who  expostulated  with  me  for 
running  away.  I  told  him  I  would  rather  run 
away  twenty  times  than  be  sent  to  the  work- 
house. He  had  an  American  trunk  and  several 
other  things  belonging  to  me,  but  he  refused  to 
give  them  up.  Later  he  inherited  some  money 
and  bought  a  horse  and  cab  of  his  own.  He 
was  always  saying  that  when  this  money  came 
he  would  help  my  brothers  but  not  me:  we  none 
of  us  had  a  pennyworth  of  help  from  him.  It 
was  at  this  time  I  discovered  that  he  and  my 
mother  had  not  been  married,  and  I  certainly 
would  not  have  accepted  anything  from  him,  I 
was  so  angry  about  it. 

Later  he  lived  with  another  woman,  who  made 
my  poor  sister's  life  during  her  childhood  as 


62  GEORGE  MEEK 

much  a  burden  to  her  as  mine  had  been  to  me. 
The  little  golden-haired  fairy  has  grown  into  a 
big,  dark  woman  now;  she  is  married  and  has 
many  children. 

I  went  to  the  bakehouse  on  the  Monday  morn- 
ing and  was  engaged  regularly  at  a  small  salary. 
Previously  the  two  elder  sons  had  done  the  work, 
employing  a  journeyman;  on  my  return  I  found 
Ernest,  the  second  son,  anxious  to  give  up  baking 
to  become  a  carpenter,  so  I  suppose  I  took  his 
place,  and  he  was  apprenticed  to  Alfred  Bore,  his 
maternal  uncle.  Frank,  the  third  son,  whom  I 
first  met  at  the  Gazette  office  (where,  I  believe,  he 
was  to  have  been  trained  as  a  journalist),  also  went 
in  for  the  plane  and  chisel  instead:  the  youngest, 
Walter,  having  just  left  school,  joined  us  in  the 
bakehouse:  the  journeyman  had  been  dismissed. 

In  Horace  Stretton,  the  eldest  son,  I  had  a 
good  friend.  A  tall  thin  young  man,  he  did  not 
enjoy  very  robust  health;  and,  if  everything 
one  hears  of  his  younger  days  is  true,  he  was  one 
of  the  gayest  of  a  gay  set  of  fairly  well-to-do 
young  men  about  town  at  that  time.  He, 
like  all  the  Strettons,  was  very  intelligent,  taking 
a  keen  interest  in  books,  as  well  as  other  things. 
He  was  an  ardent  volunteer,  as  was  also  his 
brother  Frank,  and  rose  to  be,  I  believe,  sergeant- 
major  in  the  2nd  R.  S.  V.  B.  A.  The  second  son, 
Ernest,  was  much  quieter,  greatly  addicted  to  the 
harp  and  mandoline,  which  he  played  well.  Of 


BACK  TO  EASTBOURNE         63 

Frank,  the  third  son,  I  did  not  see  much  (he 
never  worked  in  the  bakehouse) ;  but  the  youngest, 
Walter,  was  there  with  me  a  great  deal,  as  he 
mostly  took  charge  of  the  shop  during  the  day 
while  Horace  was  out  with  the  horse  and  cart 
delivering  the  bread.  Like  a  good  many  younger 
sons,  Walter  was  the  best  business  man  of  the 
family. 

To  write  the  history  of  this  family  is  practic- 
ally to  write  the  history  of  Eastbourne  for  a 
hundred  years.  Early  in  the  nineteenth  century 
the  town  consisted  of  one  large  village — now 
known  as  "Old  Town" — and  what  one  might 
call  three  small  hamlets.  Going  from  the  Old 
Town,  which  lies  in  a  kind  of  recess  in  the  hills, 
through  Compton  Place  Road,  the  old  coach 
road,  and  passing  Compton  Place  itself,  then 
the  residence  of  the  Earls  of  Burlington,  now 
one  of  the  many  country  seats  belonging  to  the 
Dukes  of  Devonshire,  one  came  to  the  village 
of  Meads,  nestling  close  under  Beachy  Head. 
There  is  a  tradition  that  no  one  ever  died  at 
Meads  in  those  days.  It  comprised  then  a  farm- 
house or  two,  a  few  cottages  occupied  by  farm 
hands  and  fishermen,  and  a  row  occupied  by 
coastguards.  In  front  of  these,  which  stood  on 
the  site  at  present  occupied  by  the  Convalescent 
Home,  there  was  a  stretch  of  allotment  gardens 
reaching  to  the  edge  of  the  cliffs,  with  one  or 
two  old  cottages  in  one  corner.  These  gardens 


64  GEORGE  MEEK 

were  cultivated  by  the  coastguards,  about  one  of 
whom  a  story  is  told.  He  had  dug  a  plot  of 
ground  up  close  to  the  edge  of  the  cliff  in  which 
he  wished  to  plant  cabbages,  when  he  found  he  had 
left  his  cabbage  plants  behind  at  home,  so  he 
went  indoors  to  get  them.  When  he  returned 
with  them  the  plot  he  had  dug  was  gone.  There 
had  been  a  landslip. 

At  the  foot  of  the  slope  from  Beachy  Head, 
towards  the  marsh  on  the  main  coach  road,  stood 
South  Bourne,  a  hamlet  of  a  few  houses  and  an 
inn  or  two,  much  used,  if  tradition  is  reliable, 
in  the  olden  times  by  smugglers.  It  is  now 
almost  entirely  swept  away  and  is  occupied  by 
South  Street.  The  Town  Hall  at  the  top  occupies 
the  site  of  the  old  stocks  bank,  so  that  offenders 
against  the  majesty  of  the  law  were  conducted  to 
the  same  spot  in  olden  times  as  they  are  still. 

Near  the  sea,  at  the  east  end  of  the  present  town, 
were  a  few  fishermen's  cottages,  with  some  better 
houses  used  by  the  few  summer  visitors  who 
ventured  so  far  from  London. 

In  those  days  the  grandfather  of  the  young 
men  I  worked  with  was  apparently  the  sole  car- 
penter, wheelwright  and  undertaker  in  the  place. 
He  occupied  a  large  house  in  High  Street,  which 
had  a  lion  over  the  porch,  from  which  it  took  its 
name,  and  workshops  at  the  rear  in  which,  even 
in  my  time,  were  many  quaint  old  appliances  of 
his  trade,  besides  some  valuable  old  chests  which 


BACK  TO  EASTBOURNE         65 

were  then  used  as  corn-bins!  The  old  gentle- 
man lived  in  this  house  till  his  death  at  the  ripe 
old  age  of  ninety-six.  The  lords  of  the  manor 
had  always  been  anxious  to  acquire  the  property, 
which  was  his  own  freehold;  since  the  death  of 
a  daughter,  or  daughters,  to  whom,  I  believe, 
he  bequeathed  it,  they  have  acquired  it,  and  it  is 
now  demolished. 

His  son,  the  father  of  my  friends,  was  a  gentle, 
quiet  old  gentleman — a  bit,  I  believe,  of  an  in- 
valid. I  am  afraid  he  was  not  a  great  business 
man.  He  formerly  owned  a  mill  near  Folkington, 
which  was  burnt  down  when  I  was  a  boy  at 
Jevington.  I  saw  the  reflection  of  the  fire  in  the 
sky,  little  thinking  I  should  know  its  owner  and 
his  family  so  intimately  in  after  years.  It  stood 
in  ruins  for  a  great  while  and  was  sold  at  last  for 
a  mere  song.  The  family  seemed  to  have  a  good 
deal  of  property  in  various  parts  of  the  country, 
but  for  some  reason  or  other  they  did  not  appear 
to  look  after  it  much. 

My  friends  lived  with  their  father  and  mother 
in  two  copyhold  cottages  they  had  near  the  Star 
brewery.  These  two  cottages  had  been  con- 
verted into  one,  a  shop  window  replacing  the 
window  of  one  of  them.  At  the  back  was  a 
largeish  garden  surrounded  by  hothouses  con- 
taining grape-vines  and  peaches,  which  were  the 
father's  special  care.  Years  ago,  he  told  me, 
he  used  to  grow  for  Covent  Garden  market 


66  GEORGE  MEEK 

and  make  very  good  prices  indeed.  When  I 
first  knew  him  his  grapes  (Black  Hamburg,  I 
believe  they  were  called)  fetched  2s.  6d.  and 
3-s.  per  pound,  and  the  peaches  3^.,  qd.  and  6d. 
each.  He  did  little  or  nothing  else  besides  look 
after  these  hothouses. 

The  mother  was  a  cheerful,  bustling  busi- 
ness woman.  There  was  also  a  sister — a  girl 
in  short  frocks  when  I  returned  to  Eastbourne. 
I  forget  whether  it  was  one  or  two  nights  a  week 
I  was  privileged  to  go  up  there  to  tea  (the  bake- 
house was  in  South  Street),  but  it  was  one  or 
the  other.  Indeed,  for  a  good  many  years  I 
spent  many  happy  evenings  there,  even  after  I 
left  their  employment,  and  I  used  to  delight  to 
hear  the  old  gentleman's  stories  of  old  times 
and  old  people  in  Eastbourne:  of  the  lady  of  the 
manor,  Mrs.  Gilbert,  who,  with  a  Major  Willard, 
the  magistrate  of  that  day,  ruled  the  town;  of  the 
time  of  the  Chartist  rising,  when  the  farmers, 
shopkeepers  and  other  well-to-do  people  stood  or 
slept  behind  barred  and  bolted  doors  with  guns 
loaded,  expecting  a  raid  by  the  peasantry.  Bless 
their  timid  hearts!  the  English  peasantry  forgot 
how  to  rise  hundreds  of  years  ago. 

Sometimes  a  friend  of  Ernest  would  drop  in 
and  there  would  be  music — the  harp  and  mando- 
line coming  into  play.  They  were  both  very 
old  instruments:  the  harp,  which  Ernest  put  into 
repair  himself,  a  big,  very  mellow  one;  the  mando- 


BACK  TO  EASTBOURNE         67 

line  a  flat-backed  Italian  one  with  an  open-work 
copper  cover  to  the  sounding  hole  and  a  queerly 
shaped  head,  from  which  the  instrument  had  to 
be  tuned  with  a  key  like  that  of  a  watch.  They 
had  a  very  old  violin,  too,  which  had  been  in 
the  family  from  time  immemorial.  A  competent 
violinist  whom  I  took  to  look  at  it  pronounced 
it  a  Guarnerius.  Ernest,  who  now  occupies  his 
father's  old  home,  has  all  these  instruments  still, 
I  believe.  The  old  house  is  but  little  changed,  but 
the  garden  and  greenhouses  are  gone.  Tomb- 
stones are  now  made  where  grapes  used  to  grow. 
And  all  the  rest  are  gone  except  Ernest:  Horace 
is  in  Gloucester,  Frank  in  London,  Walter  has  a 
flourishing  business  of  his  own  in  the  town;  but 
the  father  and  mother  and  the  daughter,  of  whom 
they  were  all  so  fond,  have  gone  to  their  last 
rest. 

Besides  the  nights  in  the  house  there  used  to 
be  afternoons  and  evenings  in  the  garden,  when 
I  and  Walter  used  to  get  into  mischief  and  some- 
times quarrel,  and  Mrs.  Stretton  used  to  declare 
she  "would  not  have  that  George  Meek  up  there 
any  more."  I  and  Walter  were  about  of  an  age. 
In  one  corner  there  was  a  furnace  underground, 
by  means  of  which  the  houses  were  heated  in  the 
winter.  Above  this  an  old  cabinet  containing 
curious  old  carpenter's  tools,  among  them  many 
narrow  moulding  planes  of  different  patterns. 
Out  in  the  open  garden,  between  the  hothouses 


68  GEORGE  MEEK 

which  surrounded  it,  were  old  bureaux  of  walnut 
or  mahogany  standing  exposed  to  all  weathers. 

Once  or  twice  they  made  wine  out  of  the  prun- 
ings — the  shoots  and  superfluous  grapes — of  the 
vines.  They  told  me  it  was  excellent,  though 
I  don't  remember  tasting  it  myself.  They  kept  it 
in  large  stone  bottles;  one  of  these,  being  too 
tightly  corked,  exploded  one  night — and  they 
thought  the  house  had  blown  down.  They  kept 
three  dogs:  a  big  lurcher  bitch,  a  little  brown 
spaniel  named  Shot, — after  Shotover,  the  winner 
of  the  Derby, — which  was  my  special  favourite,  and 
Bob,  a  little  toy  black-and-tan — at  least  he  was 
supposed  to  be  little,  but  he  had  grown  so  fat 
on  good  living  he  could  hardly  walk. 

While  I  worked  for  them,  and  for  many  years 
afterwards,  this  place  stood  to  me  instead  of  a 
home.  Whenever  I  was  in  trouble  and  needed 
advice,  or  had  good  news  to  tell,  I  always  went 
straight  there.  I  never  slept  in  the  house.  When 
I  returned  from  London  after  staying  a  week  at 
the  Rising  Sun,  which  I  found  too  expensive,  I 
went  to  lodge  with  a  friend  of  my  grandmother  at 
Lower  Willingdon,  walking  the  two  or  three  miles 
between,  night  and  morning.  There  I  stayed 
all  that  summer,  but  when  the  bad  weather  set 
in  I  took  lodgings  in  the  town. 

I  was  employed  in  their  South  Street  bake- 
house for  about  fifteen  months.  We  did  not  begin 
very  early, — about  seven  A.M.,  when  we  had  to 


BACK  TO  EASTBOURNE         69 

make  and  bake  the  bread.  I  have  often  heard 
of  alum  being  used  in  the  making  of  bread,  but  I 
have  never  seen  a  grain  of  it  in  any  bakehouse  in 
which  I  have  worked.  Our  bread  was  made  in 
the  old-fashioned  way,  with  yeast  made  by 
ourselves  from  malt  and  hops.  Each  morning, 
with  the  bread,  a  large  boiler  was  put  into  the 
oven.  This  contained  small  potatoes,  covered 
with  water.  When  they  were  taken  out  the  water 
was  strained  off  and  the  potatoes  were  mashed 
in  a  tub  with  a  large  wooden  pestle.  They  were 
then  mixed  with  warm  water,  and  a  quantity  of  the 
home-made  yeast  mixed  with  flour  was  added. 
This,  called  the  "comp,"  was  allowed  to  stand 
till  night,  by  which  time  it  had  risen  and  nearly 
filled  the  tub,  the  top  of  it  appearing  like  the 
flowers  of  broccoli.  It  was  then  strained  into  the 
trough,  more  warm  water  and  flour  were  added, 
and  this  formed  the  "sponge."  This,  which, 
when  we  left  it  at  night,  would  be  hardly  more 
than  a  quarter  of  the  way  up  the  sides  of  the 
trough,  by  morning  would  have  risen  nearly  to 
the  top,  when  it  had  to  be  "broken  up"  with 
warm  water  into  a  thin  batter,  and  more  flour 
being  then  added,  the  dough  proper  was  made. 
This  was  allowed  to  rise,  and  then,  being  taken  out 
of  the  trough,  weighed  into  two  pound  two  ounce 
portions,  which  were  moulded  into  the  familiar 
forms  in  which  bread  is  sold.  The  rest  of  the 
day,  after  the  bread  had  been  dispatched  to  the 


70  GEORGE  MEEK 

customers,  was  spent  in  making  cakes  and  pastry 
and  cleaning  up.  Everything  in  this,  as  in  most 
bakehouses  in  which  I  have  worked,  was  kept 
scrupulously  clean.  I  much  preferred  the  mak- 
ing of  "small  goods":  it  did  not  require  so  much 
muscle  as  bread-making.  Latterly  this  depart- 
ment was  left  almost  entirely  to  me,  and  once  or 
twice  I  spoilt  a  baking  through  getting  absorbed 
in  some  book. 

When  we  were  working  together  in  the  morn- 
ing we  enlivened  the  time  by  singing  and  tell- 
ing tales.  Occasionally  we  varied  the  monotony 
with  practical  jokes.  The  bakehouse  was  partly 
underground.  It  faced  the  street,  an  iron  grat- 
ing covering  a  brick-paved  recess  where  was  a 
water-tap  and  shelves  for  keeping  butter  and 
such  things  cool.  The  door  between  the  bake- 
house and  this  recess  rose  some  eighteen  inches 
above  the  level  of  the  pavement,  so  that  we 
always  had  a  good  view  of  the  street.  One  boy 
— a  butcher's  boy,  I  think — who  used  to  pass 
frequently,  annoyed  Horace  very  much  by  the 
slip-shod  way  in  which  he  walked,  scraping  his 
hob-nailed  boots  over  the  pavement  and  espe- 
cially over  our  grating.  One  day  he  jumped  up 
on  an  old  gallon  measure  covered  with  a  thick 
piece  of  wood,  which  we  used  to  stand  upon  to 
look  out  into  the  street,  and  called  the  lad  back. 
" Hi ! "  he  said.  The  boy  turned  round.  "Here ! " 
he  said;  "I  want  you."  "What  d'  ye  want?" 


BACK  TO  EASTBOURNE         71 

said  the  boy,  coming  back.  "Does  the  parish 
find  you  in  boots?"  asked  Horace.  The  boy 
answered  something  saucy,  so  a  day  or  two  later 
he  got  a  neatly  rolled  piece  of  dough  under  his  ear 
which  had  been  sent  from  a  long  section  of  gas- 
piping  we  kept  as  a  "dough"  shooter.  This  was 
a  frequent  experience  of  some  of  our  acquaintances; 
we  knew  every  one  in  the  street.  The  upper  part 
of  our  bakehouse  door  was  filled  in  with  small 
panes  of  glass,  one  of  which  had  a  small  hole  in 
the  corner. 

I  and  Walter  were  left  in  charge  of  the  bake- 
house and  the  shop  overhead  during  the  latter 
part  of  the  day.  Here  some  of  the  girls  of  the 
neighbourhood  used  to  visit  us  occasionally,  but 
though  the  conversation  was  sometimes  pretty 
free  nothing  improper  ever  occurred,  and  for  my 
part,  though  I  suppose  they  were  passable  girls, 
I  did  not  fancy  any  of  them. 

In  the  autumn,  my  wages  having  been  raised, 
I  took  lodgings  in  a  large  house  in  York  Road, 
so  as  to  be  nearer  my  work.  It  was  kept  by  a 
very  old  lady,  who  made  her  living  by  letting  to 
unmarried  working  men.  There  were  about  a 
dozen  of  us,  railwaymen,  ostlers  employed  at 
Weston's  and  other  stables,  saddlers,  and  so 
forth.  Some  time  previous  to  my  stay  there  she 
had  lost  nearly  all  the  young  men  who  were 
lodging  with  her  at  the  time  by  one  sad  accident. 
Eleven  of  them  had  taken  a  large  boat  one  Sunday 


72  GEORGE  MEEK 

morning  for  a  trip ;  a  sudden  squall  overturned  it, 
and  only  one  of  them  reached  the  shore  alive. 
In  my  time  a  young  man  named  Smith,  the  son 
of  a  Kentish  paper-maker,  met  with  a  serious 
accident  at  the  railway  station,  where  he  was 
employed  as  "lampey."  Part  of  his  duty  con- 
sisted in  changing  the  lamps  in  the  carriages  when 
trains  ran  into  Eastbourne.  Trying  to  climb  a 
coach  one  day  while  the  train  was  still  in  motion, 
he  missed  his  footing  and  was  run  over,  losing  one 
leg.  He  was  a  clever  chap,  and  had  made  two  or 
three  model  locomotives  and  electric  batteries. 

Here,  during  the  winter,  we  spent  many  lively 
evenings,  playing  cribbage,  don,  euchre,  or  some- 
times, for  a  change,  "tippet,"  a  variation  of  the 
game  of  "cod  'em,"  which  Jack  Jones — not  he  of 
West  Ham,  but  the  Covent  Garden  porter  of  that 
name  made  famous  by  Albert  Chevalier — was 
said  to  be  very  good  at.  This  is  eminently  a 
game  for  six,  eight,  ten,  or  even  twelve,  people  to 
play,  and  is  very  popular  amongst  working  people. 
Having  chosen  your  sides,  which  must  be  of  an 
equal  number  of  players,  one  of  them  is  selected 
to  "work  the  piece"  on  each  side.  This  "piece" 
may  consist  of  a  farthing  or  some  small  coin,  or  a 
button.  The  "worker"  who,  by  the  familiar 
method  of  "tossing,"  wins  the  piece  and,  so  to 
speak,  first  innings  for  his  party,  taps  it  sharply 
on  the  table  and  proceeds  to  hide  it  in  one  of  the 
hands  of  one  of  the  players  on  his  side,  which  have 


BACK  TO  EASTBOURNE         73 

previously  been  placed  as  nearly  as  possible 
all  together  in  his  lap  under  the  table.  He  then 
calls  "Up!"  and  all  the  hands  are  placed  clenched 
on  the  table.  Beginning  with  the  right-hand 
man,  each  player  on  the  other  side  takes  it  in 
turn  to  try  to  "fetch  the  piece  home"  by  guess- 
ing in  which  of  the  hands  it  is  hidden.  He  may 
point  out  a  certain  hand  and  cry  "Piece!"  at 
once  if  he  chooses  to  do  so,  or  he  may  tell  those 
on  the  opposite  side  to  take  their  right  or  left 
hands  away,  or  any  individual  player  both  of 
his.  If  any  of  these  contains  the  "piece"  he 
has,  of  course,  lost  it,  but  if  he  says  "Piece!"  to 
the  hand  which  contains  it  or  orders  all  the 
other  hands  off  he  has  won  it.  The  "worker" 
on  his  side  proceeds  to  hide  it  and  the  rdles  are 
reversed.  Every  time  the  "piece"  remains  with 
the  side  who  has  it  they  score  one.  A  cribbage 
board  is  used,  twenty-one  or  thirty-one  being  the 
game.  In  "cod  *em"  you  may  use  any  tricky 
phrase  to  induce  your  opponents  to  reveal  where 
the  "piece"  is  hidden;  in  "tippet"  only  these  two: 
"Piece"  or  "Take  it  away."  If  the  "piece"  is 
accidentally  dropped  on  the  floor  while  it  is  being 
"worked"  the  side  which  has  dropped  it  loses  it. 
With  the  exception  of  one  lodger,  who  soon 
had  to  find  fresh  quarters,  none  of  the  men  came 
home  the  worse  for  drink,  though  now  and  then  a 
good  deal  of  "small"  beer  was  consumed.  They 
were  a  pretty  happy  lot,  and  we  had  some  lively 


74  GEORGE  MEEK 

evenings.  They  were  easily  led,  I  imagine,  as 
while  when  one  young  man  came  who  was  ultra- 
religious  and  insisted  on  preaching  to  them  and 
having  "Sankey  and  Moody"  every  night,  most  of 
them  "got  religion"  slightly  for  a  time.  When 
another  man,  a  clever,  studious  house-painter  from 
Nottingham,  who  had  lived  previously  in  London, 
where  he  had  frequently  attended  secular  lectures, 
came  to  live  with  us  and  preached  the  militant 
atheism  of  those  days,  they  were  just  as  ready 
to  listen  to  him.  He  was  a  tall,  dark  man,  who 
had  studied  and  travelled  much.  His  favourite 
reading  at  that  time  was  Taylor's  Astronomical- 
Theological  Discourses,  long  passages  from  which 
he  would  quote  to  us.  He  was  also  intimate  with 
other  branches  of  learning,  and  would  keep  the 
others  interested  for  hours  by  his  long  discourses 
of  plant  or  animal  life,  astronomy,  geology  or  the 
wonders  of  chemistry.  He  occupied  the  same 
room  as  myself,  and  we  had  long  talks  together.  I 
had  from  my  earliest  years  found  great  difficulty  in 
getting  to  sleep  early  at  night,  so  that  it  was  no 
hardship  for  me  to  lie  awake  and  talk,  and,  indeed, 
long  after  he  had  gone  to  sleep  I  used  to  lie  awake 
pondering  over  what  he  had  told  me. 

My  people  had  been  Church  of  England  to 
the  extent  that  they  conformed  to  that  com- 
munion when  attendance  at  a  place  of  worship 
appeared  to  them  imperative:  that  is  to  say  at 
christenings,  confirmations,  weddings  and  funerals 


BACK  TO  EASTBOURNE         75 

of  members  of  the  family.  Otherwise  I  never 
remember  them  attending  any  place  of  worship. 
Beyond  being  obliged  to  repeat  the  usual  little 
child's  prayers  and  hymns  when  very  young,  I 
had  no  religious  teaching  at  home.  I  am  of 
opinion  that  the  "gentry  and  clergy"  were  usually 
regarded  as  our  natural  enemies.  I  know  the 
parson  was  usually  spoken  of  with  more  or  less 
derision.  Canon  Lowe  was  an  exception. 

In  spite  of  my  school  attainments  in  "scrip- 
ture knowledge,"  I  am  afraid  my  ideas  of  religion 
were  extremely  vague.  I  never  remember  to 
have  had  any  fear  of  hell,  but  I  liked  to  think 
of  some  supermundane  power  which  could  be 
called  upon  to  help  in  times  of  trouble,  or  when 
one  wanted  anything  very  badly  and  could  not 
see  one's  way  to  get  it  by  ordinary  means,  and  this 
conception  of  the  Deity  I  found  it  hard  to  part 
with.  It  was  fully  a  week  before  I  came  round  to 
my  agnostic  friend's  views,  but  I  have  held  them 
with  occasional  lapses,  of  which  I  hope  to  treat  in 
a  future  chapter,  ever  since. 

When  the  warmer  days  came  the  parades  and 
the  young  women  to  be  found  there  claimed 
my  fellow  lodgers'  attention.  There  were  a  few 
humorous  adventures  with  servant  girls,  with 
no  particular  harm  in  them,  in  which  I  partici- 
pated, and  I  had  one  or  two  experiences  of  my 
own.  There  was  one  girl  in  service  at  East- 
bourne whom  I  met  at  my  grandmother's  at 


76  GEORGE  MEEK 

Willingdon  one  Sunday  afternoon.  I  always 
spent  my  Sundays  with  my  grandmother  while 
she  remained  at  Willingdon  and  I  was  in  East- 
bourne. I  took  a  passing  fancy  to  this  girl,  and 
we  walked  back  into  the  town  together;  but  I 
was  too  modest  to  suit  her,  and  she  gave  me  up. 
Apart  from  the  fact  that  at  sixteen — the  age  I 
had  reached  by  this  time — a  lad  is  rather  suscepti- 
ble to  the  charms  of  the  fair,  I  had  always  been 
naturally  of  an  affectionate,  not  to  say  amorous, 
disposition,  yet  I  contracted  no  striking  regard 
for  any  one  girl  at  this  time.  When  I  did  fall  in 
love  later  it  was  with  a  vengeance! 

I  have  always  liked  to  live  what  I  call  a  "full" 
life,  that  is  to  say,  one  not  confined  to  a  single 
interest.  In  addition  to  reading,  of  which  I 
was  always  fond,  and  these  flirtations,  I  became 
an  ardent  politician  once  more.  At  the  bake- 
house I  met  another  Radical  of  the  Reynolds' 
type.  He  lodged  in  the  house  over  the  shop 
in  South  Street,  which  was  sub-let,  and  spent 
many  hours  preaching  the  gospel  of  advanced 
Radical-Republicanism  to  us,  though  I  am  afraid 
I  was  his  only  disciple.  I  still  used  to  see  the 
shoemaker  at  Willingdon  on  Sundays,  and  borrow 
books  of  him,  so  that  between  the  two  I  became 
well  grounded  in  their  faith.  A  wave  of  reform 
was  sweeping  the  country,  the  agitation  for  the 
extension  of  the  franchise  was  at  its  height,  and  we 
all  expected  great  things.  The  Franchise  and 


BACK  TO  EASTBOURNE        77 

Redistribution  Bills  were  passed  by  the  Gladstone 
ministry  in  the  same  year.  I  do  not  remember 
attending  any  political  meetings,  except  one  at 
the  Devonshire  Park,  where  the  late  Lord  Edward 
Cavendish  made  what  I  considered  a  poor  halting 
speech,  nor  did  I  read  Reynolds'  myself  very 
regularly ;  but  I  was  imbued  with  a  sense  of  class- 
consciousness,  which  has  intensified  since,  and  I 
thought,  with  so  many  others,  that  the  Liberals 
were  going  to  do  such  wonders  for  the  working 
people.  The  wonders  we  expected  are  still  to 
be  accomplished,  and  most  of  us  have  now  found 
a  new  party  and  new  associations.  Life  is  short, 
and  one  is  weary  of  being  always  fed  upon  an 
east-wind  diet  of  empty  promises. 

This  period  was  a  very  happy  one.  I  had 
my  liberty,  as  much  money  as  was  good  for 
me,  and — with  the  exception  of  three  days  when 
I  was  laid  up  with  a  very  severe  cold — I  enjoyed 
good  health.  I  was  subject  to  those  very  heavy 
colds,  the  kind  which  make  one  feel  nearly  dead, 
all  the  time  I  worked  indoors.  I  was  not  badly 
dressed;  Horace  Stretton,  who  always  took  a 
pride  in  dressing  well,  gave  me  several  things  he 
had  outgrown.  When  I  was  in  the  "Home"  in 
London  we  used  to  go  to  Stepney  Causeway  (to 
the  principal  Home)  for  our  clothing,  which  was 
debited  to  us,  and  we  had  to  pay  for  it  out  of  our 
earnings. 

In  1885,  the  Strettons'  trade  having  fallen  off, 


78  GEORGE  MEEK 

I  was  discharged  at  the  end  of  the  summer  season. 
I  am  afraid  they  were  all  rather  too  easy-going 
to  be  "good  business  people."  The  amounts 
some  of  their  poor  customers  owed  them — and 
most  of  their  customers  were  poor — were  sur- 
prising. As  I  am  not  convinced  that  people  are 
rewarded  or  punished 'In  any  future  life  for  the 
good  or  ill  they  do  in  this,  I  am  glad  to  take  this 
opportunity  of  expressing  my  appreciation  and 
gratitude  to  this  family  for  their  kindness  towards 
myself.  If  I  had  only  been  stronger  and  they 
more  prosperous  in  their  business,  I  could  not 
have  desired  a  happier  life  than  one  spent  in  their 
employment. 

During  this  period  I  went  to  the  theatre  occa- 
sionally with  "passes"  given  us  for  displaying 
the  bills  in  the  shop.  I  remember  seeing  Dion 
Boucicault's  Flying  Scud,  besides  various  other 
melodramas.  I  fancy  it  must  have  been  about 
this  time  that  the  Gilbert  and  Sullivan  operas  were 
put  on  the  road,  but  though  some  of  them  were 
put  on  at  the  newly-opened  Theatre  Royal  I  did 
not  see  any  of  them.  Melodrama  was  my  only 
attraction,  and  I  doubt  if  I  should  have  appreciated 
either  the  fine  music  of  Sullivan  or  the,  if  possible, 
finer  wit  of  Gilbert.  On  the  parades  the  enter- 
tainments seem  to  me  to  have  been  better  and 
more  varied  than  they  are  now.  There  was,  I 
particularly  remember,  a  troupe  of  real  negroes 
who  had  been  stranded  in  the  town  by  the  break-up 


BACK  TO  EASTBOURNE         79 

of  an  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin  company.  They  were 
such  good  singers  and  comedians  and  gave  us  such 
lovely  real  plantation  songs  that  I  have  never 
cared  for  the  artificial  kind  since. 


CHAPTER  VII 

LONDON  AND  NEW  YORK 

FINDING  I  could  get  no  other  employment  in 
Eastbourne,  the  roving  spirit  took  hold  of  me, 
and  I  tramped  to  Brighton,  a  distance  of  twenty- 
five  miles.  Here  I  stayed  for  a  week,  lodging 
at  a  comfortable  coffee-shop,  but  I  could  get  no 
work.  So  I  went  on  to  London. 

I  spent  two  or  three  days  tramping  round,  and 
the  nights  in  the  streets.  Homeless,  penniless, 
hungry,  I  walked  about  looking  at  the  closed 
blinds  and  shutters,  envying  every  one  who  had 
work  to  do  and  a  bed  to  sleep  on.  At  last  I 
obtained  work  in  a  wood-chopping  yard  in  the 
East  End.  I  began  by  helping  to  carry  the 
sawn  blocks  from  the  machine  shed  to  the  chop- 
pers, but  the  sawyer  having  an  accident,  cutting 
off  a  thumb  and  finger,  and  the  others  being 
afraid  to  tackle  the  job,  I  was  asked  to  do  so. 
This  I  did.  They  said  I  should  have  my  head  cut 
off  before  long.  But  I  operated  the  saw  for  some 
months,  with  only  a  slight  scratch  on  the  back  of 
my  thumb  which  hardly  drew  blood.  It  was 

80 


LONDON  AND  NEW  YORK      81 

hard,  tedious  work  standing  in  the  same  place  and 
doing  the  same  thing  for  ten  hours  a  day.  There 
were  about  a  hundred  and  twenty  men  and  boys 
employed  there  then.  I  was  in  London  in  1895, 
when  the  manager  told  me  the  number  of  hands 
had  been  reduced  to  forty  owing  to  the  competition 
of  the  Salvation  Army  "elevators."  Comment! 

I  had  been  corresponding  for  some  time  with 
a  brother  of  my  grandmother  who  lived  at  War- 
saw, Wyoming  County,  New  York.  He  wished 
to  get  me  out  there,  so  he  sent  me  a  prepaid 
passage  ticket  from  London  to  his  place. 

The  1885  election  was  about  this  time,  but  I 
took  little  interest  in  it:  I  used  to  be  too  tired 
to  take  much  interest  in  anything. 

I  left  Euston  on  a  wet  evening,  arriving  in 
Liverpool  about  midnight.  Here  I  embarked 
for  New  York.  I  was  fearfully  sick  for  the  first 
two  or  three  days.  We  were  all  herded  together 
in  the  steerage,  packed  like  herrings  in  a  barrel, 
sleeping  twenty-four  in  a  cabin.  There  were 
people  of  all  nationalities  on  board — even  two 
Turks.  The  life  of  the  ship,  after  we  had  found 
our  sea-legs,  was  a  Jew  who  could  yodel  "Sweet 
Violets,"  and  an  eccentric  Irishman  who  sang 
night  and  day.  "The  Wanderer  from  Clare" 
was  his  favourite  song. 

We  had  fog  for  three  days  on  the  Banks  of 
Newfoundland,  the  foghorn  going  night  and 
day.  The  voyage  took  us  ten  days  and  a  half. 


82  GEORGE  MEEK 

The  vessel  was  the  City  of  Richmond,  the  same 
in  which,  I  found  afterwards,  a  cousin  of  mine 
had  crossed.  The  food  was  plentiful  and  good. 
The  only  things  I  disliked  were  the  boiled  meat 
and  the  fish  on  Fridays.  When  we,  much  to  our 
relief,  reached  New  York,  I  was  greatly  struck 
with  the  river  steamers  with  their  machinery  on 
deck.  The  river  was  full  of  half  melted  ice  and 
snow.  At  Castle  Garden  they  passed  me,  though 
I  had  only  about  a  dollar  in  my  pocket,  because  I 
was  booked  through  to  friends;  this  in  spite  of 
my  eyes. 

I  did  not  see  much  of  New  York  City.  I  was 
struck  most  by  the  hideous  overhead  railways, 
with  their  noise  and  dust,  and  the  ferry  which 
was  like  the  section  of  a  street,  with  vans,  'buses 
and  other  traffic  standing  on  it.  I  was  on  top 
of  a  'bus,  but  could  not  see  the  river  for  the  high 
bulwarks.  At  Jersey  City  "depot"  I  first  tasted 
American  "pie."  It  was  a  round,  plate-shaped 
piece  of  pastry,  well  lined  with  apples  or  pump- 
kin— I  forget  which — and  cost  me  five  cents. 
Another  five  cents  procured  me  two  ounces  of 
very  good  fine-cut  tobacco.  Of  this  I  was  very 
glad.  The  tobacco  I  had  bought  on  the  steamer 
for  ninepence  the  half-pound  was  a  hard  slab  of 
cake  cavendish  which  had  to  be  cut  up  for  smok- 
ing, and  was  rather  too  strong  for  me  then. 

A  night-ride  through  the  Catskills,  thinking 
of  Rip  Van  Winkle,  regretting  it  was  night;  then 


LONDON  AND  NEW  YORK      83 

in  the  morning  snow.  Snow  everywhere!  More 
snow  than  I  had  ever  seen  before.  We  arrived 
at  Rochester  about  ten.  I  found  I  should  have 
to  go  by  a  different  line  to  Warsaw,  and  it  being 
Sunday  there  was  no  train.  So  an  "express" 
man  who  was  at  the  dep6t  took  me  to  a  hotel  called 
York  House.  Here  I  wondered  at  the  meals — 
such  a  variety  of  dishes  for  each  one.  The 
waiters  and  waitresses  laughed  at  me  for  spread- 
ing my  butter  on  my  toast.  The  company  in  the 
sitting-room  interested  me  greatly.  \  They  told 
tall  stories — mostly  about  women. '  I  had  a 
game  of  draughts  ("checkers"  in  American)  with 
a  judge.  In  the  afternoon  I  took  a  stroll  round 
the  city.  The  buildings  I  thought  very  fine, 
the  cold  intense.  I  noticed  that  where  a  house 
or  shop  was  vacant,  it  was  not  "to  let,"  it  was 
"to  rent."  Muldoon's  Picnic  was  billed  for  a 
theatre.  (The  Two  Orphans  was  staged  at  the 
Brooklyn  Theatre  the  night  my  father  was 
killed.) 

The  next  morning  I  was  awakened  at  six  to 
catch  the  Warsaw  train.  The  glass  was  fourteen 
degrees  below  zero.  My  hotel  bill,  as  I  had  little 
money,  was  forwarded  to  my  uncle,  who  settled 
it.  I  think  I  left  my  trunk  as  security. 

I  must  speak  with  unstinted  praise  of  the 
American  railway  car.  One  has  room  to  move. 
Each  contains  stove,  water- tank  and  lavatory; 
the  windows  are  large  and  wide,  so  that  one  gets 


84  GEORGE  MEEK 

a  decent  view  of  the  country;  I  have  turned  up 
my  nose  at  the  English  railway-carriage  ever 
since  my  return  to  this  country.  The  car  from 
New  York  to  Rochester  *  was  fitted  with  wire- 
woven  reversible  seats,  the  one  to  Warsaw  with 
arm-chairs  fixed  to  the  floor  on  twists,  so  that 
one  could  turn  any  way.  More  snow  and  miles 
of  curious  zig-zag  fences.  Then  Warsaw. 

I  had  always  directed  my  uncle's  letters  to 
"Box  375,  Warsaw  P.  O."  It  seems  there  were 
no  postal  deliveries  there.  If  one  had  corre- 
spondence it  had  to  be  poste  restante,  each  resi- 
dent having  a  separate  numbered  box.  There 
was  no  one  to  meet  me  at  the  dep6t,  as  a  letter 
I  sent  saying  I  was  coming  did  not  arrive  till  a 
day  after  I  did,  so  I  went  to  the  post  office  and 
asked  them  to  direct  me  to  my  uncle's  house, 
which  they  did.  He  lived  about  half-a-mile  out 
of  the  town  on  a  small  holding  of  his  own.  On 
the  way  there  the  high  wooden  sidewalks  and 
the  children  with  their  sleds  interested  me.  My 
reading  of  American  stories  in  Young  Folks  had 
prepared  me  for  a  good  many  things  I  saw. 

When  I  reached  my  uncle's  house  my  aunt 
opened  the  door  to  me.  She  gave  an  exclamation 
of  surprise  and  disappointment  when  she  saw  me. 
"You  will  never  do,"  she  said.  "You  are  not 
strong  enough — and  your  eyes!"  However,  she 
gave  me  an  excellent  breakfast. 

She  had  only  one  son,  and  he  had  not  done 


her  the  credit  she  felt  she  deserved.  He  had  been 
a  failure  in  England,  and  they  had  gone  to  America 
in  consequence.  He  was,  as  I  found,  a  failure 
there.  She  had  hoped  by  getting  me  there  to 
achieve  some  kind  of  social  success.  What  it  was 
I  do  not  know,  but  she  told  me  afterwards  that 
she  had  hoped  to  take  me  out  into  local  society, 
and  had  been  looking  forward  to  it.  She  never 
did  take  me,  so  that  I  saw  but  few  of  the  people  of 
the  town.  My  uncle  took  me  to  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church,  of  which  he  was  an  officer  of 
some  kind,  one  Sunday  night.  I  thought  the 
service  dreary  and  uninteresting. 

When  my  uncle  came  home  he  was  disap- 
pointed too.  They  concluded  at  once  that  I 
should  never  do  out  there.  They  "guessed"  I 
should  never  stand  the  climate,  and  the  sun 
would  be  too  much  for  my  eyes.  My  uncle  was 
a  Puritan  of  the  Puritans.  My  only  vice  at  that 
time  was  my  beloved  pipe.  Smoking  was  a 
deadly  sin  in  his  opinion. 

Their  family  lived  originally  at  Ludgershall 
in  Buckinghamshire.  There  were  several  sons. 
My  grandmother  told  me  that  in  their  young 
days  they  were  very  wild.  They  were  all  big, 
raw-boned  men,  and  used  to  play  football.  Every 
football  match,  she  told  me,  used  to  mean  a  free 
fight  afterwards.  This  was  in  the  early  nineteenth 
century.  There  were  nine  children,  and  their 
father's  wages  were  ten  shillings  per  week,  out  of 


86  GEORGE  MEEK 

which  they  paid  two  shillings  rent.  The  sons,  to 
add  to  the  family's  food,  used  to  take  sacks  and  go 
out  at  night  turnip-stealing.  Talking  of  turnips 
and  this  period,  it  is  on  record  that  a  farmer  near 
Eastbourne  caught  a  poor  labourer  eating  a  raw 
turnip  he  had  pulled  up  from  a  field  on  his  way 
home.  The  farmer  made  the  man  hold  the  turnip 
above  his  head  for  an  hour  while  he  stood  over  him 
with  a  horsewhip,  lashing  him  every  time  he 
lowered  it.  That  farmer  was  a  pillar  of  the 
Calvinist  chapel.  If  he  and  such  as  he  are  in 
heaven,  I  would  rather  go  to  the  other  place. 
England  under  Protection — under  the  rule  of  the 
landlords! 

To  return  to  America.  I  remained  at  my 
uncle's  three  days.  I  had  to  dodge  round  behind 
the  "horse  barn"  when  I  wanted  a  smoke.  They 
fed  me  well.  I  lived  well  all  the  time  I  was  in 
America.  I  never  sat  down  to  tables  so  well 
spread  before  or  since.  They  were  loaded  with 
so  many  and  such  good  things,  they  recalled 
the  Homeric  feasts.  Breakfast,  dinner  (mid- 
day), supper  were  all  alike.  Not  in  "courses"; 
everything,  I  believe,  was  put  on  the  table  at  once 
and  you  ate  whatever  you  chose.  My  aunt 
had  two  boarders  who  worked  in  the  salt  wells, 
a  local  industry.  They  amused  one  with  their 
queer  yarns,  intoned  in  their  quaint  voices.  They 
had  been  out  West,  and  knew  things.  At  night 
I  lay  awake  under  four  or  five  eider-downs,  in 


LONDON  AND  NEW  YORK      87 

addition  to  fleecy  blankets,  listening  to  the  pass- 
ing sleigh-bells.  The  house  was  on  the  main 
road  between  Warsaw  and  Wyoming,  the  county 
town. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

AN  AMERICAN  FARM 

MY  cousin  hired  a  farm  on  the  hills  about  five 
miles  from  his  father's  house.  He  worked  it  on 
"shares,"  finding  the  stock  and  machinery,  and 
giving  the  owner  a  quarter  of  the  annual  pro- 
duce. I  walked  to  it  through  the  snow  the  third 
day  after  my  arrival.  I  had  no  money  and  no 
tobacco,  so  that  the  long  walk  was  not  cheerful. 
When  I  arrived,  however,  I  met  with  a  hearty 
welcome.  The  first  thing  I  asked  for  was  tobacco. 

The  menage  consisted  of  my  cousin  and  his 
wife,  their  two  children,  both  girls,  respectively 
nine  and  eleven  years  of  age,  and  the  "hired 
man."  My  cousin  was  fond  of  excitement  and 
pleasure,  given  to  dealing  rather  than  work. 
His  wife  was  a  big,  buxom,  jolly,  good-natured, 
simple  woman,  a  native  of  Hull.  Surely  no  one 
ever  made  such  delicious  bread  and  pastry! 
Her  great  sorrow  was  that  she  had  only  girls. 
They  were,  however,  bright,  companionable  little 
things.  The  "hired  man"  was  named  Hohen- 
stein,  an  American  born  of  Saxon  parents.  He 

88 


AN  AMERICAN  FARM  89 

was  a  fine,  well  set-up  blond  man  —  the  ideal 
Saxon.  He  had  worked  in  the  car-building 
shops  at  Buffalo,  and  had  left  owing  to  labour 
troubles.  He  was  a  member  of  the  "Knights  of 
Labour."  We  soon  became  great  friends.  The 
"hired  man"  on  an  American  farm  occupies  a 
very  different  position  to  that  of  an  English 
farm  hand.  He  was  paid  eighteen  shillings  per 
week,  with  board  and  lodging  during  seven 
months  of  the  year.  During  the  other  five  he 
could  cut  wood  at  eight  shillings  a  cord.  He 
could  earn  a  great  deal  over  his  keep  at  that, 
allowing  for  impossible  weather.  One  day  Hohen- 
stein  took  me  down  into  Warsaw.  He  took 
me  to  a  billiard  saloon.  There  were  no  drinking 
saloons,  as  for  the  time  being  it  was  a  prohibition- 
ist county  the  teetotalers  having  got  their  nominee 
elected  as  excise  officer.  In  this  saloon  twopence- 
halfpenny  was  charged  for  fifty  up  or  for  a  game 
of  pool.  There  were  several  well-dressed  men 
playing — men  with  good  clothes,  white  starched 
shirts,  and  heavy  gold  watch-chains.  I  said  to 
Hohenstein,  "You  seem  to  have  a  good  many 
well-to-do  people  here?"  He  answered:  "These? 
They  are  only  farm  hands  or  workers  in  the  salt 
wells." 

The  farm-house  was  a  big,  roomy,  well-lighted 
building.  Two  things  impressed  me  about  it. 
One  was  that  whereas  when  I  first  arrived,  and 
for  some  time  after,  we  walked  straight  into  the 


90  GEORGE  MEEK 

doors  back  and  front  off  the  snow,  when  the 
spring  came  the  back  and  front  doors,  with  the 
"stoop,"  were  four  or  five  feet  above  the  ground. 
The  second  was  that  I  could  never  see  out  of  my 
bedroom  window  for  the  first  few  months  owing 
to  the  frosted  glass. 

Besides  the  humans,  the  life  of  the  farm  con- 
sisted of  many  individuals  with  whom  I  soon 
became  intimate.  There  was  "Grover,"  the 
collie  dog,  named  after  Cleveland.  (My  cousin 
was  a  Democrat  in  politics.)  I  loved  Grover. 
He  was  a  most  delightful  dog.  He  would  join 
in  our  games,  take  the  cattle  or  sheep  out  to 
the  meadows  or  fetch  them  home  entirely  "on 
his  own,"  and  now  and  then  he  would  take  a 
day  off  woodchuck  hunting.  He  would  get  his 
tail  full  of  burrs  and  perform  evolutions  similar 
to  those  of  a  boy's  top  in  trying  to  get  them  out. 
He  was  a  lemon-and-white,  about  two  years 
old. 

Then  there  were  the  horses,  about  ten  of  them. 
One  was  a  chestnut  filly  named  Jenny,  with  a 
tail  about  two  yards  long,  whom  I  broke  to  the 
saddle.  Her  favourite  amusement  was  to  chase 
the  cows  round  the  yard,  gambolling  like  a  kitten, 
and  trying  to  see  if  she  could  stand  on  her  head. 
Another  was  a  mare  in  foal,  whom  I  had  to 
gently  exercise  with  nothing  but  a  horse-rug  on 
her.  She  had  a  backbone  I  shall  never  forget. 
I  rode  her  the  five  miles  down  to  my  uncle's 


91 

through  the  mud  when  the  frost  broke,  in  that 
same  old  blanket. 

There  were  cows  and  heifers  whom  I  had  to 
currycomb  every  morning;  fifty  merino  sheep 
looking  like  tabby  cats  or  tigers  in  their  creased 
wool ;  a  curly-horned  ram  who  was  difficult  to  get 
on  speaking  terms  with.  Chickens  galore,  all 
sorts,  but  mostly  Wyandottes  and  Houdans; 
small  breeds,  which  eat  little  but  lay  large  eggs. 
Red  pigs,  no  cat.  Cats  and  rabbits  in  America 
run  very  small  and  skinny.  The  woodchuck, 
Grover's  favourite  quarry,  was  a  pretty  animal 
with  fine  grey  fur,  a  body  like  a  rabbit,  a  head 
like  a  rat.  Its  fur  is,  unfortunately,  useless,  as 
all  the  hair  falls  out  before  it  can  be  cured. 

Laughing  hyena  birds  and  hen-hawks  were  the 
only  two  wild  birds  I  noticed.  There  were 
plenty  of  snakes.  Hohenstein  ploughed  up  a 
nest  of  thirty-two  in  one  furrow  in  the  spring, 
and  Grover  killed  the  lot  by  breaking  their  necks 
with  his  teeth. 

One  thing  I  noticed  about  the  people,  they 
were  exceedingly  prudish.  They  did  not  call  a 
ram  by  that  name.  I  think  they  called  it  a 
buck.  The  wife  of  a  neighbouring  farmer  whom 
I  asked  whether  a  new-born  calf  was  a  lady  or 
gentleman  calf  was  quite  offended.  They  had  the 
biggest  black-and-white  pig  in  the  county.  The 
wife  was  boiling  down  maple  syrup  into  sugar, 
and  her  husband  had  just  shot  a  skunk,  yet  she 


92  GEORGE  MEEK 

was  angry  with  a  poor  benighted  Englishman 
for  asking  an  innocent  question  ! 

My  reception,  as  I  said,  was  cordial.  They 
gave  me  tobacco  and  promised  to  get  me  more. 
Hohenstein  used  to  chew,  and  bought  his  in 
wooden  buckets — a  dollar  a  bucket,  I  think. 
Smoking  tobacco  was  sold  in  half-pound  packets 
at  tenpence  a  pound,  good  cool-smoking  tobacco 
such  as  one  cannot  buy  in  this  God-forsaken 
country  at  any  price.  They  also  gave  me  a 
ripping  supper. 

The  next  day  I  was  set  to  do  the  "chores." 
I  got  up  about  eight  (it  was  in  January),  then  I 
went  out,  watered  and  fed  the  horses,  cattle,  and 
sheep,  helped  to  groom  the  former,  chopped 
wood  for  the  stoves  (only  wood  was  burned). 
The  wood  is  cut  from  the  tree  trunks  in  about 
eighteen-inch  lengths  and  then  split  with  an 
axe.  After  breakfast,  which  was  always  a  very 
substantial  meal,  with  about  a  dozen  different 
dishes  to  choose  from,  we  harnessed  up  the 
horses  to  the  heavy  hauling  sledge  and  went  to 
the  woods  felling  trees.  The  ground  was  uneven. 
We  went  over  hedges,  ditches,  anything,  over 
the  deep  snow,  going,  as  Hohenstein  used  to  say 
"to  hell  across  lots."  Sometimes  the  sledge 
(sleigh,  they  called  it),  a  wagon  body  taken 
from  its  axles  and  fixed  on  runners,  would  tilt 
over  and  deposit  us  in  the  snow,  amidst  much 
laughter,  the  horses  looking  round  and  grinning 


AN  AMERICAN  FARM  93 

at  us.  Then  there  would  be  hewing,  I  thinking 
of  Hawarden.  We  wore  gloves  like  those  made 
for  babies  in  England,  in  which  only  the  thumb 
is  separate.  Ordinary  gloves  would  be  useless 
against  the  intense  cold.  They  provided  me 
with  a  long  pair  of  rubber  boots,  the  most  com- 
fortable footwear  I  have  ever  known,  and  a  big 
fur  cap  which  came  right  away  down  over  my 
ears.  Hein!  it  was  cold,  but  it  was  good  to  be 
alive. 

Then  back  to  dinner  and  the  "chores"  again. 
The  watering  of  the  cattle  was  an  experience. 
There  was  an  unfreezable  artesian  well  for  the 
horses  and  the  house;  the  cattle  watered  at  a 
dugout  trough,  the  ice  in  which  had  to  be  chopped 
out  with  an  old  axe  every  time  to  make  room 
for  the  water.  Before  the  next  watering  came 
it  froze  solid  again.  The  same  thing  happened 
with  the  long  sheep-troughs. 

Then  a  stroll  to  some  neighbouring  farm,  per- 
haps, and  supper.  After  supper  an  adjournment 
to  the  "parlour."  Here  was  a  huge  blazing 
stove  as  big  as,  and  not  unlike,  a  large  christening 
font  in  a  church.  Rocking-chairs;  I  wonder 
when  our  dull-brained  countrymen  will  learn  to 
appreciate  rocking-chairs?  On  the  table  great 
pans  of  rosy  apples  and  dun  russets,  foaming 
jugs  of  home-made  dry  cider — a  curious  drink 
for  the  winter,  but  sufficient  in  that  hot  room. 
Cards,  euchre  and  vingt-et-un  ad  lib.,  the  stakes 


94 

being  apples.  Tiens!  If  I  had  been  strong  and 
had  had  my  eyes  I  could  have  lived  so  all  my 
days.  Of  course,  being  a  boy  in  America,  and 
having  read  so  many  American  stories,  I  had  to 
have  a  revolver.  This  I  bought  second-hand  of 
Hohenstein.  It  was  called  a  "Pepper-box" — it 
had,  not  separate  chambers,  but  four  barrels,  the 
"needle"  revolving  instead  of  the  chambers,  as 
in  a  modern  one.  I  never  had  occasion  to  use  it 
and  when  I  left  America  Hohenstein  gave  me  a 
dollar  for  it  back  again. 


CHAPTER  IX 

SPRING  ON  THE  FARM 

WHEN  you  see  any  particular  heading  to  any 
of  my  chapters,  you  must  not  expect  to  get  what 
it  promises  all  at  once.  You  will  not  always 
get  it.  You  are  not  going  to  get  the  spring  yet 
awhile.  There  are  other  things  to  be  recorded. 
First  there  was  a  fearful  storm  which  swept  away 
a  long  row  of  rock-elms,  leaving  them  lying  prone 
in  the  snow  like  a  row  of  dead  men.  Then  there 
is  the  winter  scenery  which  I  forgot  amidst  the 
crowding  memories  evoked  by  the  last  chapter. 

The  country  was  hilly,  not  unlike  my  own 
Sussex  downlands,  only  instead  of  smooth  green 
surfaces,  the  summits  crowned  with  occasional 
cairns,  these  hills  were  snow-covered  and  cut  in 
all  directions  by  deep  gullies  called  "gulfs." 
These  again  were  lined  with  evergreen  hemlocks 
from  whose  fronds  the  snow  and,  later  in  the 
thaw,  the  icicles  glittered.  Those  icicles,  when 
the  thaw  set  in,  hung  from  all  tree  branches  and 
from  the  leaves  sometimes,  as  much  as  a  yard 
long. 

95 


96  GEORGE  MEEK 

I  was  disappointed  to  find  there  was  no  skating 
or  sliding,  but  all  waters  were  buried  deep  beneath 
the  snow.  Instead,  we  took  the  sleds  and  tobog- 
ganed down  the  slopes,  Grover  chasing  us  and 
barking  with  envy  at  our  fun.  Then  there  was 
the  maple  tapping.  Huge  pans  were  placed 
under  the  trees  and  incisions  made  in  their  bark. 
The  sap  so  collected  was  boiled  till  it  became 
syrup.  If  you  wanted  sugar  you  boiled  it  still 
more.  You  have  never  tasted  maple  syrup  or 
sugar,  have  you?  They  have  the  flavour  of  honey 
and  something  else  indescribably  sweet  mixed 
together.  My  cousin  Mary  used  to  prepare 
a  dish  for  us  fit  for  any  gods  living  or  dead.  She 
took  fine  corn-meal  and  boiled  it  as  you  would 
boil  rice.  Then  we  ate  it  with  maple  syrup  and 
milk  fresh  from  the  cow.  Does  your  mouth 
water,  you  grimy  Londoner?  Go  into  the  Gaiety 
or  Romano's,  or  the  Troc  or  the  Savoy,  or  any 
such  place,  and  see  if  with  any  money  you  can  pay 
you  can  get  anything  half  so  good. 

The  trees  I  remember  were  maple,  iron-wood, 
rock-elm,  slippery-elm  and  hemlock.  I  remember 
no  more.  The  slippery-elm  has  a  yellow  viscous 
outer  section  covering  a  very  hard  red  pith,  the 
colour  of  raw  mahogany,  taking  up  about  a  third 
of  its  diameter.  This  red  core  of  the  tree,  Hohen- 
stein  told  me,  was  sometimes  used  by  cabinet- 
makers, but  it  was  difficult  to  work,  as,  besides 
being  very  hard,  unless  when  fresh  sawn  into 


SPRING  ON  THE  FARM         97 

planks  it  was  fastened  out  flat  securely,  it  would 
coil  up  like  a  spring.  The  yellow  outer  section 
was  damp  and  cool.  It  could,  if  one  was  very 
thirsty,  be  chewed,  and  in  that  way  would  relieve 
thirst. 

At  last  spring  came  and  laborious  days.  We 
cleared  the  barn-yards  of  their  manure  and  spread 
it  over  the  land.  Ploughs  were  got  out  and  got 
ready  for  use;  the  wooden  roller,  a  solid  tree- 
trunk  chipped  into  form,  was  put  in  order;  the 
wagon  body  was  taken  from  the  runners  and 
replaced  on  its  axles  and  wheels.  The  best 
buggy,  caked  with  mud,  was  brought  out  and 
washed. 

Before  I  quite  leave  the  winter  I  must  recall 
one  day,  a  Sunday,  I  and  my  cousin  drove  to 
his  wife's  relations'  farm  in  a  sleigh.  This  was 
fourteen  miles  away.  We  hitched  up  his  crack 
pair  of  bays.  The  sleigh  itself  was  as  light  as 
a  feather,  as  one  would  say,  the  body  was  of 
papier-mache,  rounded  like  a  bathchair,  not 
unlike  that  of  a  bathchair  in  appearance,  only  it 
held  two.  It  had  a  leather  dash-board  in  front, 
with  an  iron  rail  for  the  reins  to  run  over.  The 
runners  were  made  of  steel  tubing.  We  were 
wrapped  up  to  our  eyes.  The  cold  was  awful. 
We  were  covered  in  with  a  buffalo-skin,  our  fur 
caps  came  down  to  our  eyebrows,  great  woollen 
wraps  smothered  over  our  noses  leaving  us  hardly 
room  to  breathe.  The  bells  on  leather  belts 


98  GEORGE  MEEK 

jingled  on  the  bays.  Tree,  fence  and  home- 
stead flew  by  us  like  lightning.  There  was  no 
sound  except  the  bells  and  the  faint  pad  of  our 
horses'  shoeless  hoofs  on  the  snow.  Up  and 
down,  gliding  silently,  smoothly,  a  glide  so  swift 
that  one  lost  one's  breath. 

At  the  farm  they  had  to  pull  my  boots  off  and 
put  me  in  front  of  the  stove;  I  was  half  frozen. 
My  cousin's  wife's  mother  had  married  a  second 
husband,  a  bit  of  a  wild  man;  I  heard  after  I 
returned  to  England  that  he  had  been  frozen  to 
death.  He  had  gone  down  into  the  town,  got 
the  worse  for  drink,  he  and  his  horse  had  fallen 
asleep  on  the  homeward  journey  and  been  found 
frozen  stiff  the  next  morning. 

I  am  a  long  while  getting  to  that  spring,  I 
know,  but  I  linger  lovingly  over  some  of  these 
memories.  They  did  not  partake  of  the  sordid 
everyday  life  in  England. 

When  the  spring  did  come,  the  sun  came  out 
hot  and  hot.  No  August  we  know  could  com- 
pare with  that  April.  The  roads  were  a  sea  of 
mud,  the  fields  a  quagmire,  but  seed  had  to  be 
sown  and  lambs  and  calves  cared  for  on  their 
entrance  to  this  world  of  sorrow.  My  cousin 
and  his  wife  watched  all  night  for  the  coming  of 
colts  and  calves.  One  Sunday  morning  I  had 
the  unspeakable  horror  of  having  to  hold  lambs 
while  they  were  being  mutilated.  They  say  it  is 
necessary.  I  suppose  under  present  conditions  it 


SPRING  ON  THE  FARM         99 

is,  but  it  is  horrible.  It  is  horrible.  Better  far 
that  the  whole  race  of  sheep  should  die  and  man- 
kind exist  without  mutton  or  woollen  garments 
than  that  such  things  should  be. 

The  cows  began  to  give  milk  and  the  hens  to 
lay.  I  was  sent  out  into  the  fields  with  Hohen- 
stein  to  plough.  I  ploughed  one  lonely  furrow, 
a  crooked  one,  then  I  was  relieved  of  that  most 
useful  employment.  They  do  not  plough  like 
the  English.  They  use  a  light  iron  instrument 
with  nothing  to  change  (is  it  coulter? — I  fear 
I  have  forgotten  the  name  of  the  part  changed 
in  the  English  plough).  They  plough  a  straight 
furrow,  and  then  go  round  and  round  it  till  the 
field  is  ready  for  the  seed.  The  horses,  too,  do 
not  follow  each  other.  They  walk  abreast,  two 
or  three  of  them,  according  to  the  weight  of  the 
soil.  The  ploughman  has  the  reins  fastened 
behind  him  so  that  he  can  move  either  of  his 
hands  from  the  plough  handles  to  turn  the  horses. 
No  ploughboy  is  employed. 

Of  the  neighbouring  Irish  farmers  who  used 
to  come  and  steal  our  corn  in  the  night,  of  the 
two  old  American  ladies  who  owned  the  farm  on 
the  other  side  of  us,  of  many  other  things  I  must 
write  some  other  day. 

"The  bird  of  time  hath  but  a  little  while 
To  flutter;  and  the  bird  is  on  the  wing." 

But  one  thing  I  had  to  do  there  which  I  hated 


100  GEORGE  MEEK 

doing.  I  had  to  kill  a  kitten,  a  mangy,  diseased, 
stray  little  tortoiseshell  about  twelve  months  old. 
It  was,  I  take  it,  a  merciful  thing  to  put  an  end 
to  its  misery;  but  I  shall  never  forget  the  appeal- 
ing look  in  its  eyes,  or  its  misplaced  confidence  in 
creeping  up  to  me  (I  had  been  kind  to  it,  as  I  am 
invariably  to  all  dumb  friendly  things),  while  I 
held  a  tough  bough  of  iron-wood  behind  me  pre- 
meditating its  death.  And  I  shall  never  forget  it 
as  it  lay  bleeding  in  the  snow  after  I  had  struck 
it  one  terrible — fortunately  accurately  aimed — 
blow.  I  have  been  compelled,  with  the  utmost 
reluctance,  to  perform  the  same  office  since  to 
stray  and  hopelessly  useless  cats,  and  I  consider 
that  all  those  who  keep  female  cats  should  be 
compelled  either  to  provide  for  their  offspring  or 
see  that  they  are  destroyed.  Only  recently  I 
have  had  to  destroy  a  hopelessly  unclean  kitten 
which  strayed  to  our  present  home.  Apart  from 
all  questions  of  "tariff  reform"  or  current  politics, 
it  seems  to  me  that  a  heavy,  a  very  heavy,  tax  on 
all  female  cats  has  become  an  urgent  public  need. 


CHAPTER  X 

LEAVING  AMERICA 

ONE  day  my  cousin  had  tapped  a  fresh  barrel 
of  cider.  I  was  at  work  planting  potatoes  in 
the  kitchen  garden.  You  don't  "dib"  potatoes 
in  America  as  you  would  in  England.  The 
season  is  too  short.  You  take  a  broad-bladed 
hoe  and,  having  well  dug  your  plot,  you  draw 
furrows  across  it  with  one  side  of  the  hoe-blade. 
Then  you  put  your  potatoes  in  so  far  apart,  and 
hoe  the  earth  over  them.  Well,  this  potato- 
patch  was  close  to  the  cellar  door.  I  pride  myself, 
having  some  meagre  knowledge  of  Euclid's  Ele- 
ments, on  being  able  to  draw  a  straight  line. 
I  was  drawing  reasonably  straight  furrows,  but 
my  cousin  did  not  think  so.  So  he  took  the  hoe 
to  show  me  how  to  go  on.  All  his  furrows  began 
at  their  right  point,  and  kept  fairly  parallel  with 
their  fellows  for  a  time.  But  as  he  neared  the 
cellar  door  they  deviated  considerably  in  that 
direction.  After  each  attempt  he  paid  a  visit 
to  the  newly-tapped  barrel,  and  returned  to 
demonstrate  again.  Each  attempt  to  instruct 

101 


102  GEORGE  MEEK 

me  proved  more  and  more  a  failure,  till  finally 
he  went  into  the  "parlour"  and  lay  on  the  sofa, 
where  he  peacefully  slept  for  a  time,  and  I  ad- 
journed to  lunch  with  his  wife,  my  bonny,  buxom 
cousin  Mary.  Poor  dear  old  Mary!  So  patient, 
so  kind,  so  good-natured!  Is  it  not  always  so, — 
that  the  good  women  marry  the  bad  men,  and 
vice  versa  ?  She  was  good,  every  inch  of  her  five 
feet  eight.  Clean,  active,  as  strong  as  a  young 
mule,  more  tender-hearted  than  a  boarding-school 
miss,  clever,  capable,  a  good  cook,  a  good  house- 
wife, economical,  a  good,  affectionate  mother,  a 
kind,  considerate  hostess.  Dear  old  Mary!  I 
have  n't  heard  from  her  for  years.  I  hope  her 
after  life  was  happy.  She  deserved  that  it  should 
be,  but  one  does  n't  always  get  one's  deserts  in 
this  world,  if  ever. 

I  did  a  considerable  amount  of  work  on  the 
farm,  so  that  as  I  received  only  my  board  and 
lodgings  I  partly,  if  not  wholly,  outset  my  pas- 
sage money.  My  cousin  afterwards  gave  up  the 
farm  and  took  a  hotel  when  the  county  had 
voted  in  favour  of  licences. 

I  left  New  York  on  a  misty  day — the  day  the 
Bartholdi  statue  was  unveiled — in  June,  and 
had  a  pleasant  voyage  to  Glasgow  on  the  Anchor 
Line  boat  Ethiopia,  being  eleven  days  on  the 
way.  There  were  not  many  passengers  on  board. 
I  helped  the  steward,  and  fared  more  or  less 
sumptuously  every  day.  I  left  my  trunk  behind 


LEAVING  AMERICA  103 

on  the  quay  at  New  York.  It  was  forwarded  by 
the  next  boat  and  sent  on  to  Eastbourne,  un- 
opened even  by  the  Customs  officials.  It  con- 
tained one  pound  of  tobacco,  two  pounds  of  tea, 
a  ham,  and  many  other  good  things.  I  went 
direct  to  Eastbourne.  The  railway  journey  was 
fearfully  long.  I  left  St.  Enoch's,  Glasgow,  at 
two  P.M.,  and  did  not  reach  King's  Cross  till 
four  the  next  morning.  I  had  to  wait  some  time 
at  Leeds,  and  should  have  had  a  look  round  but 
it  poured  in  torrents.  I  have  always  wanted  to 
see  the  north  and  north  country  towns;  but 
that  stay  at  Leeds,  with  Jupiter  Pluvius  very 
much  in  evidence,  has  been  my  only  chance. 
On  the  way  to  America,  during  the  few  hours  I 
was  in  Liverpool,  I  was  too  intent  upon  getting 
aboard  my  steamer  to  take  much  interest  in 
the  city.  On  my  return  I  saw  a  little  of  the 
Clyde  by  moonlight  and  day.  We  landed  at 
Greenock,  going  on  to  Glasgow  by  rail.  In  the 
compartment  I  travelled  in  were  several  of  our 
passengers  and  some  of  the  crew  of  the  Ethiopia, 
and  a  discussion  arose  on  the  subject  of  smug- 
gling. One  of  the  sailors  laughed  at  the  idea  of 
getting  mere  tobacco  through.  He  had  either 
some  sheet  music  or  lace — I  forget  which — con- 
cealed beneath  his  shirt.  One  of  the  passengers 
had  some  large  cases  of  books  with  him.  He 
was  an  author,  and  they  were  his  own  work. 
I  went  back  to  my  old  lodgings,  and  was  out 


104  GEORGE  MEEK 

of  employment  for  some  weeks.  Then  I  got  a 
situation  as  groom  with  an  eccentric  Irish  doctor, 
I  found  his  horses  less  amenable  to  reason  than 
my  old  American  friends;  one  bolted  with  me 
and  another  tried  to,  a  third  was  so  nervous  that 
she  would  shy  if  anyone  only  looked  at  her. 
My  sight  got  me  discharged,  as  I  did  not  allow 
enough  for  a  gatepost  when  I  was  driving  a 
victoria.  Then  I  found  occasional  jobs.  One 
was  with  a  second-hand  book  dealer.  This 
suited  me  extremely  well.  I  had  always  been 
an  omnivorous  reader,  and  minding  the  shop 
for  him  I  had  plenty  of  opportunities  for  study. 
In  America  we  had  The  New  York  World  and 
The  Inter-Ocean;  the  only  book  I  distinctly 
remember  reading  there  was  Peck's  Bad  Boy. 
Good  old  Peck!  I  read  his  Uncle  Ike  only  last 
week  and  enjoyed  it. 

A  Liberal  Club  had  been  opened  in  Eastbourne 
during  my  absence,  and  I  became  a  member. 
Here  I  spent  most  of  my  spare  time  when  out 
of  work.  During  1887  I  was  out  of  work  most 
of  the  time.  I  was  employed  for  a  while  as 
sewing-machine  agent,  but  could  not  succeed  in 
getting  sufficient  orders.  It  was  at  about  this 
time  I  became  friendly  with  Ruth. 

After  I  returned  from  America  the  first  situa- 
tion I  had  was  with  a  furniture  dealer,  an  ardent 
Liberal  who  had  even  christened  his  son  "Wil- 
liam Ewart."  He  was  the  most  ill-tempered  man 


LEAVING  AMERICA  105 

I  ever  worked  for.  Do  what  one  would  one 
could  not  satisfy  him.  I  had  heavy  loads  of 
furniture  to  wheel  to  different  houses  on  a  truck, 
carpets  and  linos,  to  lay,  bedsteads  to  put  up, 
and  so  on,  most  of  which,  though  it  taught  me 
a  few  things  which  have  been  useful  since,  was 
not  easy  work.  My  wages  were  ten  shillings  per 
week,  not  a  very  "liberal"  remuneration  for  a 
lad  of  eighteen — as  I  then  was.  This  happened 
in  1886,  the  "Home  Rule"  year,  when  Glad- 
stone's enormous  red  herring  succeeded  so  well 
in  diverting  the  public  attention  from  essential 
social  reforms,  and  incidentally  put  a  Tory  Gov- 
ernment in  power  for  a  long  spell.  During  that 
winter  I  was  part  of  the  time  with  the  doctor. 
Afterwards  I  earned  an  occasional  shilling  dis- 
tributing circulars  and  so  on.  In  July  I  was 
engaged  for  the  first  time  in  registration  work 
by  the  Liberals  and  late  in  the  autumn  I  became 
assistant  steward  at  the  Liberal  Club  for  the  first 
time. 


CHAPTER  XI 

RUTH 

WE  had  a  sort  of  distant  connection  whom  my 
grandmother  visited  occasionally.  She  was,  in 
fact,  a  sister  of  the  woman  who  married  my 
grandmother's  son,  of  whom  I  have  written  in 
my  first  chapter.  Her  name  was  Moran.  She 
had  two  sons  and  several  daughters.  It  was 
her  ambition  to  give  all  her  children  some  "gen- 
teel" occupation  or  profession.  Thus  she  got 
one  son  into  a  lawyer's  office;  the  younger 
son  and  her  eldest  daughter  became  elementary 
school-teachers;  other  daughters  were  appren- 
ticed to  the  dressmaking.  At  this  time  four  of 
the  daughters  had  married  fairly  well.  Three 
had  married  shopkeepers,  the  fourth  a  kind  of 
half  manager,  half  cashier,  at  a  large  drapery 
establishment.  As  the  father,  who  had  left  their 
mother  some  years  before  I  got  to  know 'them, 
had  been  only  a  working  sawyer,  when  much  of 
the  timber  used  in  building  was  sawn  by  hand, 
this  was  a  typical  case  of  a  family  striving  more 
or  less  successfully  to  force  its  way  out  of  the 
mere  proletariat  into  the  bourgeois  class. 

1 06 


RUTH  107 

The  rapid  development  of  towns  like  East- 
bourne enabled  a  great  many  such  families  to 
emerge  from  the  status  of  wage  slaves.  In  East- 
bourne more  than  one  man  who  began  life  at 
the  plough-tail  or  with,  at  most,  some  small 
peddling  business,  had  died  worth  a  considerable 
fortune,  so  that  the  Lancashire  saying  about  the 
grandfather's  clogs  might  have  a  local  variation. 

Ruth  was  the  only  unmarried  daughter  in  this 
particular  family.  She  was  about  six  months 
older  than  I  was,  a  plump,  pleasing  girl  with 
great  masses  of  rich  brown  hair,  rather  refined  in 
her  tastes  and  dress,  very  religious,  as  most  of 
her  family  were. 

I  first  saw  her  on  a  visit  I  paid  to  them  with 
my  grandmother  when  I  was  a  small  boy  living 
at  Jevington.  The  younger  son,  Arthur,  was 
making  fireworks  for  the  ensuing  fifth  of  Novem- 
ber. Ruth  was  sitting  with  her  mother,  who 
gave  me,  I  remember,  a  large  slice  of  bread,  which 
made  me  remember  it. 

When  I  returned  from  America  my  grand- 
mother was  still  able  to  do  an  occasional  day's 
work.  She  received  two  shillings  and  sixpence 
per  week  from  the  parish,  with  bread  and  flour, 
but  as  she  paid  two  shillings  per  week  rent  for  a 
small  unfurnished  room  she  occupied  in  a  cot- 
tage at  Willingdon,  she  was  obliged  to  work 
when  she  could  get  any,  though  she  was  over 
seventy  years  old.  From  time  to  time  she  did  a 


108  GEORGE  MEEK 

day's  washing  or  charing  for  Ruth's  mother, 
who  at  that  time  lived  in  a  small  cottage  on  the 
roadside  between  Polegate  and  Hailsham.  She 
frequently  spoke  to  me  of  them,  but  I  did  not 
see  them  again  until  they  had  taken  a  house  in 
Eastbourne,  where  she  took  me  one  evening 
while  I  was  working  for  the  Irish  doctor.  I  think 
they  were  in  low  water  financially,  at  any  rate 
they  were  anxious  to  give  up  the  house  they  had 
taken  for  something  cheaper.  The  doctor  was 
in  need  of  a  caretaker  for  a  branch  surgery  he 
had,  and  Ruth's  mother  applied  for  and  obtained 
the  place. 

From  the  time  of  this  visit  Ruth  exercised  a 
great  influence  upon  me.  I  had  met  no  one  who 
had  attracted  me  so  much.  As  a  child  she  had 
been  very  delicate,  and  had  been  brought  up  in 
great  seclusion.  She  had  been  kept  and  educated 
at  home,  had  made  no  friends  outside  her  own 
family,  and  done  nothing  except  the  very  lightest 
of  house-work,  and  she  fascinated  me  with  her 
gentle,  cultured  ways. 

It  was  proposed  that  she  should  learn  the  art 
of  dressmaking  at  home,  so  as  to  earn  something 
towards  the  family's  expenses.  She,  her  mother, 
and  the  school-teacher  son  Arthur  had  lived 
together  up  to  this  upon  his  salary,  some  of 
the  married  daughters  contributing  assistance  in 
the  way  of  clothing  for  the  mother  and  daughter. 

I  left  the  doctor's  service  shortly  after  my  firs* 


RUTH  109 

visit  to  them,  and  before  they  took  charge  of  the 
surgery,  and  had  entered  the  service  of  the  Singer 
Mfg.  Co.  as  canvasser.  I  was  supposed  to  sell 
so  many  sewing-machines  per  week  on  the  hire- 
purchase  system.  Ruth  was  one  of  my  earliest 
customers,  and  as  it  was  part  of  my  duty  to 
show  her  how  to  operate  the  machine,  I  was 
thrown  a  good  deal  into  her  society.  Even  after 
she  had  mastered  the  machine  I  visited  her  from 
time  to  time;  once  or  twice  a  week,  I  believe, 
except  now  and  then  when  her  mother  quarrelled 
with  me  and  forbade  me  the  house. 

These  visits  were  very  pleasant  to  me.  I  can- 
not for  the  life  of  me  think  what  we  used  to  talk 
about.  I  was  getting  deeper  and  deeper  in  love 
with  her,  but  I  did  not  dare  to  make  love  to  her, 
she  seemed  so  inaccessible,  and  I  was  the  greater 
part  of  the  time  out  of  work.  I  was  not  at  all 
religious  then.  I  was  leading  a  silly,  futile  life, 
half  starved  most  of  the  time,  yet  singing  at 
smoking  concerts  and  writing  verses  and  para- 
graphs for  a  local  Radical  paper.  Ruth  told  me 
afterwards  that  she  had  thought  me  shallow,  and 
I  am  not  surprised  at  it. 

Then  I  obtained  a  situation  at  the  Liberal 
Club.  The  Morans  had  left  the  surgery  and 
moved  two  or  three  times  to  different  houses,  at 
all  of  which  I  continued  to  visit  them.  I  know 
that  Mrs.  Moran  strongly  objected  to  my  friend- 
ship with  her  daughter,  yet  curiously  enough  she 


110  GEORGE  MEEK 

always  left  us  alone  together  when  I  called,  and 
I  often  stayed  an  hour  and  a  half  or  two  hours. 
I  did  occasionally  make  myself  useful  to  them. 
During  the  first  summer  I  was  at  the  Club,  Mrs. 
Moran  had  one  of  her  prohibitory  fits,  and  I  did 
not  call  for  a  week  or  two.  I  was,  I  know,  very 
miserable.  They  had  taken  a  house  near  the 
Club  where  I  worked,  and  I  had  to  pass  it  two 
or  three  times  a  day,  and  once  or  twice  I  passed 
Ruth  in  the  street,  I  think,  either  without  speak- 
ing, or  just  "passing  the  time  of  day"  at 
most. 

But  one  evening  she  stopped  me  and  asked  me 
why  I  did  not  call.  I  told  her  that  her  mother 
had  forbidden  me  the  house,  and  she  answered 
that  I  was  to  take  no  notice  of  her,  that  her  brother 
Arthur  was  seriously  ill  with  gastric  fever  and 
jaundice,  and  she  would  be  glad  to  see  me 
sometimes. 

"But,"  I  said,  "I  would  rather  not  call,  Ruth." 
We  were  walking  side  by  side  down  Susan's 
Road  towards  the  house  where  they  were  then 
living.  It  was  a  warm  summer  evening.  Ruth 
was  wearing  a  grey  "dust  cloak,"  as  it  was  called, 
and  a  pretty  white  straw  hat  trimmed  with 
daisies.  We  walked  slowly.  Twenty-one  years 
ago  this  August,  perhaps  to-day. 

"But  why,  George?"  she  asked. 

"Well,  Ruth,"  I  said,  "it  's  like  this.  You 
know  what  I  am  and  what  your  people  are,  and 


RUTH  111 

I  am  afraid  that  I  am  getting  to  care  for  you  a 
great  deal  too  much." 

"I  am  sorry  for  that,"  she  replied.  "I  thought 
so  sometimes.  Of  course  you  must  n't,  it  is  quite 
useless;  still,  you  can  call,  and  we  can  be  friends 
just  the  same,  can't  we?" 

Of  course  I  ought  to  have  been  sensible  and 
kept  to  the  resolution  I  had  made  to  try  and 
forget  her.  But  what  lad  of  twenty  is  wise  or 
strong  when  a  pair  of  sad  grey  eyes  he  has  learned 
to  love  are  turned  upon  him?  And  I  had  dreams 
and  ambitions  even  then.  Who  knows  what 
might  not  happen  some  day?  My  love  for  her 
was  very  deep  and  very  sincere;  there  was  no 
room  for  any  other  woman,  and  having  at  last 
confessed  to  her,  I  went  back  to  my  work,  like 
the  young  fool  I  was,  tremendously  happy  at  the 
slight  consolation  our  conversation  had  given  me. 

So  I  resumed  my  visits  and  they  became  more 
frequent. 

There  was  a  quarrel  with  one  of  the  married 
daughters  who  was  about  to  leave  England  with 
her  husband  and  children  for  Melbourne.  I 
acted  as  a  kind  of  go-between.  Then  when 
Arthur  became  convalescent  I  sat  and  chatted 
with  him.  He  was  an  amateur  painter,  and  I 
prophesied  that  he  would  become  President  of 
the  Royal  Academy  and  I  Poet  Laureate.  Poor 
Arthur  has  been  dead  some  years,  and  I  have 
come  to  the  conclusion  that  I  have  no  vocation 


112  GEORGE  MEEK 

for  versemaking,  much  less  for  poetry,  though  a 
few  odds  and  ends  of  mine  have  been  printed 
and  one  song  published  with  music :  I  have  never 
heard  of  any  one  singing  it  however. 

About  this  time,  probably  through  Ruth's 
influence,  I  began  to  attend  a  place  of  worship, 
going  at  first  to  the  Congregational  Church  in 
Pevensey  Road,  and  afterwards  to  the  Calvinist 
chapel.  I  became  an  ardent  Calvinist,  closing 
my  mind  to  all  the  doubts  I  had  previously 
entertained.  Ultimately  I  became  a  member  of 
the  "Strict  Baptist"  chapel.  I  read  the  Bible 
and  Puritan  and  Calvinistic  literature  assidu- 
ously. Among  the  Puritans,  Rutherford  and 
Quarle  are  exceptionally  good,  as  is  also  a  writer 
whose  name,  I  believe,  is  Dyer.  In  a  book  of 
his  I  read  far  and  away  the  most  beautiful  and 
reasonable  conception  of  Paradise  I  have  ever 
seen.  I  am  sorry  I  am  not  quite  certain  of  the 
writer's  name,  and  have  quite  forgotten  that  of 
his  book;  it  was  so  very  good,  and  when  I  meet 
with  a  good  thing  I  always  like  to  recommend 
it  to  others. 

Towards  the  end  of  1888  my  grandmother  sug- 
gested that  it  would  be  better  for  her  to  come 
and  live  at  Eastbourne,  as  she  was  getting  quite 
beyond  even  occasional  work,  and  it  would  be 
cheaper  for  us  to  live  together.  I  slept  at  the 
place  where  I  was  employed,  so  I  took  a  small 
unfurnished  room  for  her  in  Susan's  Road. 


RUTH  113 

Here  Ruth  sometimes  came  to  see  us.  She 
came  early  on  Christmas  morning.  Up  to  this 
time  I  do  not  recollect  having  sent  or  received  a 
Christmas  card;  but  I  bought  one  for  her  and 
she  brought  one  to  me.  She  seemed  very  happy 
and  jocose  that  morning.  As  we  stood  together 
shaking  hands  she  looked  up  in  my  face  and 
said,  with  one  of  those  winning  sunny  smiles  she 
could  give  on  occasion,  "I  always  felt  I  should 
like  to  marry  a  tall  man." 

Though  I  am  not  out  of  the  way  tall — I  am, 
or  used  to  be,  about  five  feet  six — this  remark  of 
hers  pleased  me  very  much.  She  made  it  in  a 
low,  soft  voice  which  made  me  long  to  take  her 
in  my  arms;  but  until  some  time  after  we  had 
not  got  beyond  a  hand-shake.  Afterwards  she 
chaffed  me  about  an  India-ink  drawing  I  was 
trying  to  make. 

This  happened  in  my  grandmother's  room, 
which  was  in  a  house  a  few  doors  away  from  the 
one  in  which  my  mother  died.  This  house,  when 
we  lived  in  it,  had  a  large  cellar  under  it  which 
in  the  winter  was  frequently  nearly  full  of  water. 
After  my  mother's  death  it  was  filled  with  chalk. 
It  was  still  occupied  by  our  old  lodgers,  a  bath- 
chair-man  named  Cook  and  his  wife.  On  this 
Boxing  Day,  as  I  went  to  my  grandmother's 
to  dinner,  I  saw  this  man  cleaning  the  windows 
of  his  front  room,  and  stood  chatting  to  him 
some  time.  On  my  return  to  work  I  met  two 


114  GEORGE  MEEK 

policemen  carrying  a  dead  body  on  a  stretcher; 
they  were  surrounded  by  a  small  crowd.  I  asked 
who  the  dead  person  was,  and  was  told  it  was 
my  friend  the  bathchair-man  to  whom  I  had 
been  speaking  less  than  an  hour  before. 

He  had  been  engaged  to  take  a  lady  to  the 
Devonshire  Park  Theatre  to  a  matinee  per- 
formance of  Booth's  Baby.  She  had  been  late  in 
starting  and  hurried  him.  He  was  a  short, 
stout  man  with  a  thick  neck.  The  approach  to 
the  main  entrance  to  the  theatre  is  rather  steep — 
I  find  it  rather  a  pull  myself — and  that,  with  the 
hurry,  was  too  much  for  the  old  man.  He  fell 
dead  from  syncope  at  the  doors. 

About  this  time  two  or  three  Eastbourne  bath- 
chair-men  died  suddenly.  One  named  Cum- 
mings  was  found  dead  alongside  his  chair  in  the 
coachhouse. 

Shortly  after  Christmas  the  Morans  made 
another  move,  taking  a  house  in  which  they  had 
a  spare  room  to  let  unfurnished.  Mrs.  Moran  sug- 
gested that  I  should  take  it  for  my  grandmother, 
which  I  did  very  readily,  as  it  would,  I  knew, 
give  me  more  opportunities  of  seeing  Ruth.  I 
helped  them  to  move  some  of  their  things,  among 
them  a  steel  engraving  of  a  woman  in  the  nude, 
which  occasioned  my  first  quarrel  with  Ruth. 
She  saw  me  looking  at  it  and  snatched  it  out 
of  my  hands.  I  made  a  simple  remark,  and 
she  flew  into  a  temper  and  would  not  be  recon- 


RUTH  115 

ciled  for  several  days.  I  said,  "Don't  you  like 
me  to  look  at  it  then?"  She  said:  "I  didn't 
mind  you  looking  at  it.  I  think  a  graceful  female 
figure  is  a  beautiful  thing  to  look  at;  but  you 
should  not  have  said  anything  about  it  to  me." 

However,  her  ill-temper  wore  off  in  time.  We 
saw  each  other  every  day,  though  I  had  to  be 
satisfied  with  just  talking  to  her  and  occasionally 
shaking  hands  with  her.  The  old  woman  soon 
quarrelled  with  me  again;  and  although  she 
could  hardly  forbid  me  the  house,  she  would  not 
allow  me  in  the  kitchen,  so  that  I  had  to  depend 
upon  chance  meetings  on  the  landing  outside 
my  grandmother's  room,  or  visits  she  paid  to  us, 
or  I  to  her,  when  her  mother  was  out  of  the  way, 
for  my  intercourse  with  Ruth.  How  long  this 
state  of  things  lasted  I  do  not  know,  but  some 
time  that  spring,  1889,  a  slight  incident  made  us 
become  lovers  in  everything  but  the  fait  accompli, 
which,  while  it  might  have  bound  us  together 
indissolubly,  would  have  robbed  our  love  of  its 
purity  and  Ruth  of  the  charming  modesty  and 
dignity  which  were  so  characteristic  of  her. 


CHAPTER  XII 

LOVERS  UNDER  THE  ROSE 

"Ax  least,"  said  Ruth  one  day  when  we  were 
discussing  the  future,  which  meant  the  likeli- 
hood or  otherwise  of  our  ever  being  married,  "if 
you  never  have  me,  you  will  always  have  the 
memories  of  these  days." 

And  they  were  very  happy  days.  I  was  very 
much  in  love,  and  though  there  was  a  good  deal  of 
risk  in  our  intercourse  and,  of  course,  occasional 
quarrels  and  misunderstandings,  that  fact  made 
my  life  during  the  next  fifteen  months  full  of 
those  beautiful  moments  which  sometimes  make 
life  worth  while. 

Our  closer  intimacy  came  about  in  this  way. 
One  afternoon  I  was  in  my  grandmother's  room 
when  I  heard  Mrs.  Moran  storming  at  her 
daughter  in  one  of  her  periodical  outrageous  fits 
of  rage.  She  had  probably  been  drinking.  She 
was  addicted  to  the  use  of  Hollands  gin,  which 
she  took  on  account  of  her  predisposition  to  rheu- 
matic gout.  She  died  some  years  afterwards 
from  dropsy  and  enlargement  of  the  heart. 

116 


LOVERS  UNDER  THE  ROSE    117 

Hearing  Ruth  coming  up-stairs  crying,  I  went 
to  the  door  to  condole  with  her.  She  was  very 
unhappy,  and  somehow  she  leaned  against  me, 
and,  putting  my  arms  round  her,  I  tried  to  kiss 
the  tears  away.  It  was  the  first  time  I  had  ever 
kissed  her.  I  had  longed  for  and  dreamed  of 
such  a  delight,  but  scarcely  ever  dared  to  hope 
for  it,  and  now,  unexpectedly,  I  was  not  only 
kissing  her,  but  she  was  in  my  arms  with  her 
head  resting  on  my  shoulder.  She  made  no 
resistance,  but  for  several  days  afterward  she 
blushed  every  time  we  met  and  was  very  shy. 

I  had  kissed  a  good  many  girls  before.  I 
kissed  Ruth  a  great  many  times  afterwards,  and, 
of  course,  I  have  done  the  same  to  a  good  many 
women  since;  but  there  has  been  nothing  before 
or  since  quite  like  that  first  kiss. 

It  was  taken  shyly,  reverently,  with  a  good 
deal  of  trepidation.  I  suppose  most  men  and 
women  who  have  lived  and  loved  at  all  can 
think  of  at  least  one  such  occasion,  which  is  my 
excuse  for  dwelling  on  it.  I  wonder  how  many 
girls  have  been  driven  by  the  unkindness  of 
those  to  whom  they  have  a  right  to  look  for  kind- 
ness to  even  greater  falls! 

After  this  we  grew  more  and  more  intimate.  I 
was  usually  free  from  ten  or  eleven  in  the  morning 
until  seven  at  night,  so  that,  as  Ruth  was  nearly 
always  at  home,  we  had  many  opportunities. 
When  her  mother  was  asleep  gr  out  she  would 


118  GEORGE  MEEK 

come  into  our  room  and  sit  with  us,  at  other 
times  I  waylaid  her  as  she  passed  the  door. 

This  went  on  for  about  nine  months;  then 
Mrs.  Moran,  in  one  of  her  fits  of  temper,  gave 
us  notice  to  quit,  and  we  took  another  room  in 
the  next  street.  Here  Ruth  used  to  come  and 
see  us  whenever  she  had  the  chance.  Nearly 
every  Sunday  afternoon  we  sat  by  the  fire  for 
an  hour  or  two  locked  in  each  other's  arms; 
grandmother  sitting  at  the  opposite  side  of  the 
fire  jealous  and  angry.  Last  winter  I  saw  a 
couple  "canoodling"  very  frequently;  they  were 
so  far  gone  that  they  could  not  restrain  their 
caresses  even  before  strangers — and  I  must  admit 
that  that  kind  of  thing  does  not  appeal  to  a  third 
party.  At  any  rate  my  grandmother  used  to  get 
very  cross,  and  after  Ruth  had  gone  I  came  in 
for  a  long  scolding,  which,  I  am  afraid,  did  not 
worry  me  very  much.  The  old  lady  was  getting 
more  feeble;  she  was  close  upon  seventy-four, 
and  early  in  the  following  March — 1890 — she 
contracted  bronchitis,  and  died  a  few  days  after- 
wards. She  was  buried  at  Langney  on  a  very 
windy  day,  I  being  the  only  mourner.  She  had 
always  been  very  fond  of  me;  no  mother  could 
have  been  more  kind. 

Previous  to  her  death,  Ruth's  mother  had 
taken  a  situation  as  housekeeper  to  a  gentleman 
who  lived  apart  from  his  wife  at  Willingdon. 
Her  son  Arthur  had  one  of  his  periodic  break- 


LOVERS  UNDER  THE  ROSE    119 

downs  at  the  time,  and  stayed  with  them.  Ruth 
was  left  in  charge  of  the  house  at  home.  She 
had  worked  up  a  private  connection  as  a  dress- 
maker. Two  rooms  of  the  house  were  let  un- 
furnished, and  she  had  to  make  up  the  balance 
of  the  rent  and  keep  herself  out  of  her  earnings, 
which  were  not  great.  We  met  out  of  doors — 
after  my  grandmother's  death  she  would  not 
visit  me — and  had  long  walks  and  talks  together, 
usually  getting  to  some  secluded  place.  Some- 
times she  walked  to  Willingdon  to  see  her  brother 
and  mother.  Then  I  walked  the  greater  part 
of  the  way  with  her,  and  met  her  again  on  her 
homeward  journey  at  night.  Once,  while  waiting 
for  her,  she  came  along  with  her  brother.  I  had 
to  get  behind  a  hedge,  and  then  we  had  to  go 
home  by  the  fields  by  Rodmell  in  the  dark  to 
avoid  being  seen.  She  was  upset  and  nervous. 
While  we  were  crossing  a  dark  lonely  field  I  was 
terribly  tempted — but  j.t  ended  at  that.  Then  at 
another  time  there  was  a  moonlight  walk  out 
towards  Rodmell  by  the  footpath  where  the 
King's  Drive  has  now  been  made.  We  got  off 
the  path  along  under  the  trees  by  a  fence.  Trees 
and  fence  are  still  there,  about  half-way  to  Hamp- 
den  Park.  Ruth  sat  on  the  fence  and  I  hugged 
her,  and  we  talked  and  talked — oh!  for  two 
hours  it  must  have  been !  I  suppose  it  is  a  matter 
of  temperament,  but  that  kind  of  love  suited 
me — with  Ruth.  I  wonder  what  I  should  have 


120  GEORGE  MEEK 

thought  of  her  if  anything  had  happened,  whether 
things  would  have  been  different,  whether  she 
would  have  clung  to  me  and  made  my  life  worth 
while,  instead  of  the  wretched  muddle  it  has 
been?  This  thought  has  often  troubled  me, 
though  Ruth  being  what  she  was,  I  do  not  see 
how  anything  could  have  happened. 

Then  her  curious  mother  sent  word  that  I  was 
to  do  some  work  at  the  Eastbourne  house.  I  was 
to  spend  three  or  four  days  digging  and  tidying 
up  the  garden.  This  with  Ruth  alone  in  the 
house,  as  the  lodgers  were  always  out.  Three 
or  four  glorious  bohemian  days !  I  had  no  regular 
work  at  the  time,  and  we  had  our  meals  together — 
just  for  those  few  days.  She  did  not  pretend 
to  be  a  good  cook.  One  day  we  bought  the  ma- 
terials for  a  steak  pudding,  and  she  made  it.  I 
don't  know  why — I  have  never  tasted  a  pudding 
like  it  before  or  since.  It  was  like  lead.  This 
was  the  height  of  our  intimacy.  We  did  every- 
thing but  fall.  From  that  we  were  saved  as 
by  a  miracle,  for  alone  together  with  every  oppor- 
tunity, in  the  spring-time,  our  young  blood 
glowing — I  do  not  take  any  credit  to  myself.  I 
never  wilfully  tempted  her,  though  we  sat  often 
for  hours  locked  in  each  other's  arms.  I  rather 
tried  to  avoid  temptation  and  to  put  all  evil 
thoughts  from  me.  I  guarded  her  honour  even 
from  myself  as  watchfully  as  if  she  had  been  my 
sister.  True,  we  were  both  deeply  religious,  we 


LOVERS  UNDER  THE  ROSE    121 

were  both  modest  and  clean-living,  but  we  were 
young  and  changeable.     Our  ideals  were  greater 
than  mere  respectability. 
But— 

"The  earthly  hope  men  set  their  hearts  upon 
Turns  ashes 

Even  stolen  pleasures  come  to  an  end.  I  had 
given  up  smoking  for  a  time  to  please  Ruth, 
but  that  was  a  vain  sacrifice;  the  gods  were 
jealous  of  what  happiness  I  had,  and  I  had  enough 
trouble  in  one  way  and  another. 

One  night  I  went  to  her  house,  but  seeing 
lights  in  more  rooms  than  usual,  suspected  some- 
thing was  wrong  and  did  not  knock.  Her  friends 
had  returned  suddenly  from  the  country,  and  I 
believe  I  had  been  forbidden  the  house  again  a 
day  or  two  previously.  Anyway,  Ruth  let  me 
know  the  next  day.  For  a  little  while — a  few 
days  or  a  few  weeks,  I  cannot  remember  which — 
we  met  by  appointment  when  we  could.  Then 
getting  careless  by  long  immunity  from  detec- 
tion, one  night  we  were  walking  arm  in  arm 
jauntily  along  one  of  the  principal  streets  when  we 
ran  full  tilt  into  her  brother.  He  said  nothing, 
but  passed  on,  merely  looking  at  us.  Ruth  gave 
a  gasp  of  pain  and  fear  and  dropped  my  arm, 
hurrying  on  to  the  shop  to  which  she  had  been 
sent. 

And  that  was  the  end.    The  next  morning  she 


122  GEORGE  MEEK 

met  me  as  usual  on  her  way  to  work.  She  had 
given  up  her  private  work  and  was  at  a  mantle- 
maker's  at  this  time.  Poor  Ruth!  she  had  been 
crying  all  night.  She  was  crying  then,  a  thick 
veil  hiding  her  tear-stained  face.  They  had  made 
her  promise  never  to  see  me  or  speak  to  me  again. 

Oh!  the  ifs  in  life.  //  I  had  had  a  good  start 
and  only  fairly  decent  prospects  in  some  decent 
trade  I  might  have  had  her.  Even  as  it  was,  if 
she  had  had  faith  in  me  I  might  have  done  better. 
I  should  not,  at  least,  have  lived  on  her  as,  they 
say,  her  husband  did  when  she  did  at  last  marry. 
But  as  nothing  I  could  say  or  do  then  could 
keep  her  to  me,  nothing  I  can  say  or  do  now 
can  undo  what  has  been  done  or  recall  her  to  me. 
And  how  I  long  for  her  sometimes!  Just  to 
talk  with  her,  to  have  her  confide  whole-heart- 
edly in  me  as  she  used  to,  to  tell  me  all  her  troubles 
and  anxieties. 

I  had  been  attending  the  same  chapel  as  Ruth 
for  some  time,  and  had  got  to  know  the  minister. 
In  this  trouble  I  went  to  him  for  consolation  and 
advice.  I  felt  I  must  open  my  heart  to  some  one. 
He  made  me  angry,  very  angry  indeed,  by  sug- 
gesting that  it  was  "just  as  well  our  intimacy  had 
been  broken  off,  as  religious  courtships  often  led 
to  immorality."  He  was  anxious  to  know  if 
there  had  been  anything  of  the  kind  between  us, 
and  I  am  afraid  the  way  in  which  I  replied  made 
us  enemies  ever  afterwards. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

THE  LIBERAL  CLUB 

IN  the  two  foregoing  chapters  I  have  spoken 
of  the  Liberal  Club.  After  my  first  turn  at 
registration  work  in  the  summer  of  1888  I  was 
out  of  work  some  time.  I  cannot  think  how  I 
managed  to  live.  I  suppose  I  must  have  had  a 
few  odd  jobs.  I  was  turned  out  of  my  lodgings 
in  York  Road  because  I  could  not  pay  my  rent, 
and  took  a  small  room  in  Bridge's  Yard.  Here 
I  was  charged,  I  think,  two  shillings  or  half-a- 
crown  a  week.  The  landlady,  who  used  to  go 
out  to  work,  was  very  good  to  me,  always  leaving 
me  a  cup  of  tea  and  a  slice  or  two  of  bread-and- 
butter  in  the  morning,  and  giving  me  something 
to  eat  at  night,  and  she  allowed  my  rent  to  stand 
over  until  I  got  work.  My  days  I  spent  looking 
for  employment,  in  the  Liberal  Club,  at  my 
friends  the  Strettons',  or  at  Willingdon  with  my 
grandmother.  Sometimes  I  know  I  was  very 
hungry,  and  tobacco,  which  was  almost  as  much 
to  me  as  food,  was  often  hard  to  come  by.  A 
second-hand  bookseller,  who  has  long  since  been 

123 


124  GEORGE  MEEK 

dead,  gave  me  occasional  jobs.  I  had  attracted 
his  attention  by  buying  books  of  him  when  I  was 
in  work,  and  selling  others  to  him  when  I  was 
hard  up.  Among  these  were  my  grandfather's 
Family  Bible  and  Hume's  History  of  England, 
which  I  parted  with  most  reluctantly.  This  man 
was  a  rabid  Tory,  a  betting  man  (most  betting 
men,  I  notice,  are  Tories),  and  we  had  frequent 
differences  of  opinion  on  politics. 

When  I  first  became  a  member  of  the  old 
Liberal  Club  it  was  under  the  management  of  the 
late  Councillor  Pearce — one  of  the  Radical  group 
on  the  Town  Council.  After  a  time  a  young 
married  member  who  was  out  of  employment  was 
appointed  steward,  and  he  engaged  me  as  billiard 
marker.  With  him  I  had  to  do  most  of  the 
cleaning,  attend  to  the  bar  during  the  day,  and 
the  billiard-room  at  night.  I  had  one  afternoon 
and  Sundays  off.  The  Club  never  opened  on 
Sundays,  which  I  spent  with  my  grandmother, 
the  afternoons  with  Ruth,  at  a  place  they  then 
had  at  Old  Town;  I  had  just  resumed  my  visits 
to  her,  which  had  been  broken  off  for  a  time  for 
some  reason  or  other. 

I  tried  to  do  my  work  well,  and  made  many 
friends  among  the  members.  But  after  a  time 
something  went  wrong  with  the  accounts:  some- 
thing was  wrong  with  the  bar  takings,  and  the 
steward  tried  to  throw  the  blame  upon  me.  He 
gave  me  notice,  but  afterwards  rescinded  it, 


THE  LIBERAL  CLUB          125 

I  was  quite  innocent  of  the  charge,  and  I  wrote 
a  letter  to  Ruth  telling  her  he  had  apologized — 
which  he  had — and  I  had  been  reinstated.  This 
letter  I  left  in  my  bedroom  (I  slept  at  the  Club 
at  the  time),  and  while  I  was  out  he  had  the  impu- 
dence to  open  and  read  it  before  I  had  posted  it, 
and  then  changed  his  mind  again  and  told  me 
I  was  still  to  consider  myself  under  notice. 

Some  of  the  members  took  my  part,  and  some 
his.  Of  course,  I  did  not  like  losing  my  work; 
but  the  accusation,  while  it  caused  me  a  good 
deal  of  inconvenience,  did  not  worry  me  much, 
because  I  knew  it  was  false,  and  I  felt  that  some- 
how I  should  be  put  right  sooner  or  later.  One 
of  the  house  committee  took  the  steward's  part 
and  tried  to  make  things  unpleasant  for  me; 
but  I  remained  a  member  of  the  Club,  taking  part 
in  the  weekly  concerts  and  some  debates  we  held 
during  the  winter,  and,  in  spite  of  his  opposition, 
I  was  given  a  night  to  read  a  paper  on  "Unem- 
ployment," a  very  appropriate  subject,  as  I  was 
out  of  work  myself.  This  man,  a  lithographer, 
with  a  great  deal  of  what  we  call  in  present-day 
slang  "swank,"  and  the  steward  raised  an  outcry 
at  this,  as  they  said  I  was  under  suspicion  of 
having  robbed  the  Club;  however,  the  other 
members  took  no  notice  of  them,  and  I  read  my 
paper.  I  was  not  an  informed  Socialist  then. 
I  remember,  however,  I  advocated  a  remedy 
which  has  formed  the  subject  of  an  address  by 


126  GEORGE  MEEK 

Sidney  Webb  only  last  week.  I  said  that  all 
lads  should  be  taught  a  trade.  Of  course,  I 
know  now  that,  desirable  as  such  a  course  would 
be,  it  would  fail  to  solve  the  unemployed  problem 
and  really  aggravate  it  in  the  skilled  trades,  but 
the  fact  that  I  knew  no  trade  thoroughly  myself, 
and  was  not  strong  enough  for  ordinary  labour- 
ing work,  had  been  the  cause  of  me  being  out  of 
work  so  much  then,  and  has  greatly  hindered 
me  ever  since.  Every  lad  should  be  thoroughly 
trained  to  some  useful  calling.  The  untrained 
young  man,  especially  if  he  is  not  particularly 
strong,  stands  a  very  poor  chance  of  maintaining 
himself,  and  had  better  be  dead  out  of  the  way. 

My  leaving  did  not  seem  to  benefit  the  Club 
exchequer.  It  was  found  that  the  spirits,  which 
should  have  been  only  fifteen  under  proof,  had 
been  broken  down  to  forty-five,  and  that  account 
of  the  wine  stock  had  not  been  properly  kept. 
So  the  whole  staff  were  discharged  at  a  moment's 
notice,  and  as  I  was  on  the  premises  at  the  time, 
the  new  steward  reinstated  me  in  my  place. 

The  old  steward  blamed  his  wife  and  emigrated 
with  his  father  and  mother  to  the  United  States. 
He  was  not  a  nice  man.  He  had  been  an  only 
son,  was  brought  up  with  ideas  a  great  deal 
above  his  means,  and,  as  I  remember  him,  while 
wishing  to  pose  and  dress  as  a  "gentleman,"  had 
the  soul  of  a  cringing  cur.  They  had  one  child, 
which  I  think  he  took  to  America  with  him. 


THE  LIBERAL  CLUB          127 

The  Club  was  hardly  paying  its  way,  and  Dick 
Winder,  the  new  steward,  was  not  given  so  large 
a  salary  as  the  old  one.  Consequently  he  could 
not  employ  me  the  whole  of  the  day,  nor  pay  me 
so  much  as  the  other  had  done.  There  was  a 
suite  of  rooms  at  the  top  of  the  house  reserved 
for  the  Club  servants;  this  Dick  did  not  want, 
as  he  kept  on  his  house  in  Susan's  Road,  a  hundred 
yards  or  so  from  the  Club;  but  he  furnished  a 
room  for  me  to  sleep  in  and  paid  me  five  shillings 
a  week,  out  of  which  I  had  to  find  my  own  food. 
My  hours  of  work  were  from  7  to  10  A.M.,  and 
from  7  to  1 1  P.M.  Not  much  of  a  job  for  a  young 
man  of  twenty,  but  better  than  being  out  of  work, 
and  I  had  the  rest  of  the  day  to  earn  odd  shillings 
in.  Mr.  Brown,  the  registration  agent,  who 
had  his  office  on  the  premises,  put  what  work  he 
could  in  my  way,  and  one  way  and  another  I 
managed  to  live,  though  I  sowed  the  seeds  of 
chronic  dyspepsia  during  the  first  part  of  my 
time  there  by  subsisting  mainly  on  cheap  pies 
which  a  baker  used  to  supply  to  the  Club.  He 
let  me  have  them  at  the  wholesale  price — two  for 
three  halfpence — and  two  of  them  (one  meat  and 
one  jam  or  fruit)  formed  my  dinner  every  day. 
Bread-and-butter  and  coffee  for  breakfast,  bread- 
and-butter  and  tea  for  tea.  This  continued  until 
my  grandmother  came  from  Willingdon  towards 
the  end  of  '88. 

I    was   appointed    collector   for    the    Working 


128  GEORGE  MEEK 

Men's  Liberal  Association,  and  so  got  to  know 
many  prominent  Liberals  besides  those  who  used 
the  Club.  I  observed  that  many  of  the  loudest 
talkers  were  the  poorest  subscribers.  One  "pro- 
minent" Liberal  of  the  rabid  Nonconformist- 
teetotal  order  refused  to  subscribe  at  all  because 
the  association  was  guilty  of  the  awful  wicked- 
ness of  holding  smoking  concerts  in  public- 
houses.  These  concerts  had  been  a  great  source 
of  pleasure  to  me  before  I  was  employed  at  the 
Club;  afterwards,  of  course,  I  could  not  get  out 
at  night  to  get  to  them.  We  had  some  really 
good  singers — poor  old  George  Holly  and  Jack 
Slaughter,  a  very  fine  tenor  and  baritone,  and 
F.  A.  Bourne,  a  far  better  comedian  than  many 
professionals.  I  sang  a  good  deal  myself. 

I  led  a  curious  life  at  the  Club.  When  not 
engaged  in  odd  jobs  I  spent  much  of  my  time  in 
reading.  This — the  earlier  part  of  the  time, 
before  I  "got  religion" — consisted  of  the  Club 
papers,  and  books  I  had  from  Pulsford's  Library. 
Of  the  former,  I  was  most  partial  to  the  Daily 
Chronicle,  Punch,  Truth,  the  Graphic,  and  the 
Illustrated  London  News.  In  one  of  the  latter  I 
read  Rider  Haggard's  She.  There  was  a  small 
library  at  the  Club,  containing  some  books  by 
Harriet  Martineau,  J.  S.  Mill  on  Liberty  (which  I 
didn't  read),  some  Cobden  Club  publications, 
but,  best  of  all,  several  of  Dickens's  novels  in  the 
"Household"  edition.  This  edition,  with  its 


THE  LIBERAL  CLUB          129 

clear-cut  illustrations  depicting  normal  people 
in  normal  clothes — for  their  period — has  always 
been  my  favourite,  and  when  I  get  very  rich  I 
intend  to  possess  myself  of  a  complete  set  of  it. 
I  always  considered  that  the  illustrations  in  the 
older  and  more  expensive  editions  were  absurd, 
and  spoilt  one's  pleasure  in  reading  the  books  to 
some  extent,  but  it  would  have  been  considered 
treason  to  have  said  so  in  those  days,  though 
others  are  beginning  to  say  so  now.  It  is  the 
same  with  other  literary  fetishes. 

I  have  been  reading  Shakespeare's  Plays  lately 
for  the  third  or  fourth  time,  and  I  cannot  for  the 
life  of  me  see  what  there  is  so  out  of  the  way 
wonderful  about  them.  I  prefer  Homer.  Then 
Scott  and  Thackeray  I  can't  stand  anyhow. 
From  Pulsford's  I  got  most  of  George  Eliot's 
novels,  which,  with  Reade's,  Hugo's,  Lytton's 
and  a  few  of  Ainsworth's,  formed  the  bulk  of  my 
reading.  George  Eliot,  Mrs.  Humphry  Ward 
and  Olive  Schreiner  are  the  only  three  author- 
esses I  could  ever  read  with  much  pleasure. 

At  night  I  had  the  choice  of  the  three  rooms 
which  formed  the  steward's  apartments  to  sleep 
in,  and  I  tried  them  all  in  turn.  It  used  to  be 
horribly  cold  sometimes  in  the  winter,  especially 
in  the  back  room,  which  faced  north-west,  but 
which  I  fancied  for  a  time  because  I  could  see 
the  Downs  from  the  window.  There  were  two 
rooms  in  front — one  with  two  windows,  one  of 

9 


130  GEORGE  MEEK 

which  looked  towards  Terminus  Road,  the  other 
into  Langney  Road.  This  had  a  bright  red- 
and-gold  paper,  and  had  been  intended  as  a 
sitting-room.  The  other,  the  smallest  room  of  the 
three,  faced  south-east,  and  overlooked  Langney 
Road.  I  used  this  the  second  winter  I  was  there, 
when  I  had  overcome  my  scruples  far  enough  to 
help  myself  to  a  fire  at  night  from  the  Club  coal- 
cellar,  because  it  got  warm  quickest.  These  three 
rooms  were  shut  off  from  the  rest  of  the  house 
by  a  green  baize  door.  Outside  this  door  was  the 
top  of  the  stairs,  with  a  members'  lavatory  on  the 
right,  and  the  large  billiard-room  facing  it.  This 
room,  with  its  two  fires,  two  windows,  large 
Burroughes  and  Watts  table  and  other  fittings, 
took  up  a  good  deal  of  my  time.  It  had  to  be 
swept  and  cleaned  directly  after  breakfast,  the 
table  well  brushed,  and,  in  the  winter,  ironed. 
Then,  too,  we  banked  the  two  fires  up  and  kept 
them  in  all  night  to  keep  the  cushions  from  getting 
hard. 

On  the  next  floor  below  there  were  five  rooms. 
On  descending  the  stairs — which  I  swept  every 
morning  and  cleaned  twice  a  week — a  passage  led 
on  the  right  to  a  small  lavatory.  On  one  side  of 
this  was  *  the  directors'  room,  which  was  hardly 
ever  used  except  by  the  secretary.  To  the  left  was 
the  card-room.  This  consisted  of  two  rooms 
thrown  into  one.  Scattered  about  it  were  a  num- 
ber of  small  baize-covered  uables  at  which  at 


THE  LIBERAL  CLUB          131 

night  the  members  played  whist  or  nap.  It  was 
said  that  a  man  had  hanged  himself  in  that  room 
years  before,  but  that  did  not  deter  me  from 
sleeping  sound  enough  in  the  rooms  overhead. 
Facing  the  foot  of  the  stairs  was  the  bar,  a  little 
room,  with  small  shuttered  windows  looking  into 
the  smoking-  and  card-rooms,  containing  shelves 
for  spirits,  tankards  and  glasses,  and  so  on,  and 
barrels  of  ale  and  stout.  Next  was  the  smoking- 
room.  It  had  a  large  bay  window  looking  into 
Langney  Road,  and  contained  a  large  number 
of  wooden  arm-chairs,  with  a  big  dining-table 
in  the  centre.  Behind  this,  and  divided  from  it 
by  double  doors  which  could  be  thrown  back  so 
as  to  convert  the  two  into  one  on  the  occasion 
of  a  concert  or  lecture,  was  the  bagatelle-room: 
this  was  patronized  by  those  members  who 
found  billiards  too  expensive.  On  the  ground- 
floor  was  the  reading-room,  a  soft-carpeted 
quiet  place,  to  the  right  of  the  entrance,  and  the 
registration-office  to  the  left,  with  a  large  kitchen, 
a  scullery  and  glass-pantry  at  the  back.  These 
last  I  had  to  myself. 

The  place  is  still  there,  the  end  house  in  Lang- 
ney Road,  with  its  upper  floors  covering  an  arch- 
way, making  them  so  much  larger  than  the 
ground-floor,  but  the  reading-room  and  the 
registration-office  have  been  converted  into  shops ; 
and  our  old  front  gardens,  with  their  shrubs, 
surrounded  every  spring  by  numbers  of  wall- 


132  GEORGE  MEEK 

flowers,  have  made  way  for  the  widening  of  the 
pavement. 

In  the  morning  all  these  rooms  had  to  be  swept, 
and  some  one  or  other  of  them  cleaned.  Dick 
took  charge  during  the  day — we  had  few  callers  in 
the  daytime,  as  most  of  the  members  were  at 
work  or  at  business.  Amongst  those  who  did 
drop  in  were  a  few  journalists,  among  them  at  one 
time  Richard  Le  Gallienne,  who  was  then  on  the 
staff  of  the  Eastbourne  Gazette.  He  was,  I  remem- 
ber, a  tall,  slight,  quiet  man.  I  got  into  con- 
versation one  day  with  him  about  a  story  I  was 
trying  to  write.  It  was  my  first  attempt  at  fiction, 
and  did  not  get  beyond  the  first  chapter.  I  found 
some  difficulty  in  producing  dialogue — a  trouble 
which  he  told  me  he  was  subject  to  himself. 

Another  member  who  dropped  in  occasionally 
during  the  day  was  the  late  Sir  John  Bennet, 
who  used  to  tell  me  of  good  books  to  read.  Among 
them,  I  remember,  he  recommended  the  Vicar 
of  Wakefield,  Tristram  Shandy,  Roderick  Random 
and  several  other  English  classics. 

But  it  was  in  the  evening  that  the  place  filled. 
The  members  were  mostly  of  the  shop-keeping 
class,  or  employed  in  shops,  though  there  were 
several  working  men.  Two  members,  both  old 
men,  stand  out  in  my  memory.  One  was  old 
John  Vine,  the  father  or  grandfather  of  many 
of  the  existing  Vines,  whose  memory  carried 
back  to  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century.  He 


THE  LIBERAL  CLUB          133 

told  of  the  "good  old  times,"  when,  if  poor  people 
were  lucky  enough  to  get  the  flour  to  make  a 
beef  pudding,  they  had  to  go  round  Beachy 
Head  to  get  the  "beef" — in  the  shape  of  limpets 
off  the  rocks.  Most  of  the  time  they  lived  upon 
"fromenty"  and  swedes.  The  other  was  the 
late  Mr.  Charles  Adams,  who  had  years  before 
lost  a  good  business  by  being  boycotted  for 
leading  the  local  agitation  against  Church  rates. 
He  was  noted  for  the  grandiloquent  language 
of  his  speeches,  and  attributed  his  hale  old  age 
to  the  fact  that  he  invariably  ate  fruit  the  first 
thing  in  the  morning  before  having  his  breakfast. 

We  opened  at  nine  A.M.  I  used  to  go  about 
my  work,  as  a  rule,  singing  songs,  until  I  "got 
religion,"  when  I  changed  them  to  hymns  of  the 
"Gadsby"  variety,  much  to  Dick  Winder's 
disgust. 

One  of  our  members  was  Dr.  Pollock,  who  at 
that  time  lived  a  few  doors  away.  Later,  when 
the  dyspepsia  consequent  upon  my  unchanging 
diet  of  cheap  pies  had  got  so  firm  a  hold  upon 
me  that  I  could  scarcely  do  my  work  or  even 
walk,  I  had  become  so  weak,  some  medicine  or 
advice  he  gave  me — I  can't  tell  which;  perhaps 
it  was  both — cured  me  in  the  course  of  a  few 
days,  though  I  had  been  going  to  another  doctor 
for  months  without  getting  any  relief.  This 
medico  was  a  strict  teetotaler,  and  ordered  me 
whatever  I  did  not  to  touch  alcohol  in  any  form. 


134  GEORGE  MEEK 

I  hardly  ever  did  at  this  time;  though  I  was 
allowed  a  pint  or  two  of  beer  a  day  at  the  Club, 
I  seldom  had  it,  as  I  did  not  like  beer.  Some- 
times in  very  hot  weather  I  would  have  a  large 
lemonade  with  a  very  small  dash — about  a  tea- 
spoonful — of  whisky  in  it  to  take  the  rawness 
off  it,  but  that  was  the  extent  of  my  dissipation. 
One  Whit  Monday,  while  I  was  at  Stretton's, 
Horace  and  some  of  the  young  men  I  lodged 
with  between  them  had  made  me  horribly  drunk, 
worse  than  I  ever  was  before  or  since,  so  that 
I  had  to  be  "frog-marched"  home,  and  that 
cured  me  of  drink  for  years  afterwards. 

Besides  this  injunction,  there  were  so  many 
things  prohibited — cakes,  puddings,  pies,  pickles, 
jams,  tea  and  coffee,  and  I  know  not  what,  that 
I  hardly  knew  what  to  eat  or  drink,  and  I  was 
then  in  a  position  to  vary  my  diet,  too.  But 
Dr.  Pollock,  after  giving  me  my  medicine,  advised 
me  to  drink  two  or  three  glasses  of  ale  or  stout 
every  day,  and  eat  anything  I  fancied  and  could 
get.  This  advice  I  followed.  I  was  soon  free 
from  dyspepsia,  and  now  I  can  make  a  hearty 
meal  off  almost  anything  eatable — especially 
my  favourite  dish,  steak-pudding — without  any 
trouble  with  my  stomach.  Doctors  are  a  curious 
lot:  for  one  who  understands  and  can  and  does 
really  help  people,  there  seem  to  be  a  dozen  who, 
for  what  good  they  do,  might  just  as  well  be 
automatic  fee-taking  machines. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

ODDS   AND   ENDS 

ONCE  when  I  was  in  London  I  heard  the  revival- 
ists Sankey  and  Moody  in  a  large  building  in 
Stepney  Green.  I  "got  religion"  badly  for 
a  week  or  two,  but  soon  reverted  to  my  early 
agnosticism.  I  have  never  been  troubled  much 
about  my  "soul":  I  have  had  too  much  bother 
to  live  in  this  world  to  worry  myself  much  about 
the  next.  I  have  no  doubt  I  took  up  religion  the 
last  time  to  please  Ruth. 

Although  I  made  myself  believe  in  the  Cal- 
vinistic  tenets,  I  was  no  Antinomian — unless  the 
following  makes  me  out  to  have  been  one.  One 
day — I  remember  it  most  distinctly — I  was 
standing  on  the  staircase  at  the  Liberal  Club 
looking  out  of  the  window,  when  a  thought,  a 
kind  of  proposition,  seemed  to  fix  itself  in  my 
mind.  It  was  this:  Should  I,  for  the  future, 
follow  the  strict  path  of  duty,  or  should  I  follow 
my  impulses? 

Now,  had  I  followed  the  path  of  duty,  as  I 
saw  it,  I  should  have  had  to  break  with  Ruth. 
Evidently,  in  my  position,  I  had  no  right  to 

135 


136  GEORGE  MEEK 

make  love  to  her,  and  I  should  have  had  to  give 
up  smoking,  so  that  life  would  have  been  quite 
a  dreary  blank.  So  I  decided  definitely  to  follow 
impulse,  at  least  in  these  two  things. 

In  his  Grace  Abounding  to  the  Chief  of  Sinners 
my  wife's  great  ancestor  John  Bunyan  has  set  the 
standard  to  which  all  Calvinists  aspire.  Unless 
you  have  all  kinds  of  visions  and  torments— 
"experiences"  as  they  are  called — you  have  no 
marks  of  grace.  Only  the  few  "elect"  are  to  be 
saved,  all  the  rest  of  mankind  are  to  be  damned 
for  ever  and  ever.  Some  of  them  have  gone  so  far 
as  to  say  that  "there  are  babies  on  the  floor  of 
Hell  a  span  long."  This  horrible  "faith"  held 
me  for  a  few  years,  worrying  myself  a  great  part 
of  the  time  trying  to  evoke  these  "visions"  and 
"experiences"  so  as  to  know  if  I  was  one  of  the 
"elect";  but  in  course  of  time  more  sensible 
counsels  prevailed,  and  I  resumed  my  normal  life. 
I  must  confess  that  my  experiences  and  observa- 
tions have  led  me  to  endorse  the  common  view 
that  sordid  greed  and  nonconformity  usually  go 
together.  There  are,  of  course,  exceptions.  The 
minister  of  the  chapel  of  which  I  was  a  member 
was  a  thoroughly  good  man,  as  also  is  one  of  my 
fellow  bathchair-men,  who,  although  he  con- 
demns my  agnosticism  and  numerous  follies, 
has  befriended  me  time  after  time,  always  ready 
to  forgive,  if  not  to  forget,  and  do  me  still  another 
good  turn.  But,  then,  those  two  men  believe  in 


ODDS  AND  ENDS  187 

God,  to  them  He  is  the  real,  actual  Provider  who 
will  do  everything  right.  I  have  tried  over  and 
over  again  to  fight  this  question  out  in  my  own 
mind.  I  have  no  desire  to  be  either  religious  or 
non-religious  for  its  own  sake;  I  have  wanted 
to  get  at  the  truth  of  it.  But  I  suppose  we  never 
shall,  and,  after  all,  does  it  matter  so  very  much? 
It  seems  to  me  so  much  better  to  try  to  make  the 
life  of  the  living  more  sane  and  happy  than  to 
worry  about  the  dead.  In  our  fields  and  gardens 
we  cherish  the  food-giving  trees  and  plants  and  the 
flowers,  destroying  the  weeds;  in  our  human 
society  the  producers  and  sustainers  of  life  are 
despised,  neglected,  insufficiently  nourished  and 
cared  for,  while  the  noxious  weeds  flourish  and 
fatten  on  them. 

My  Calvinism  had  one  lasting  effect:  it  left 
me  a  fatalist,  a  position  my  scientific  reading 
and  my  own  experiences  have  confirmed  me  in. 
"Free  will"  would  be  a  fine  thing — if  we  had 
any.  I  should  very  much  like  to  be  able  to  change 
my  temperament,  disposition  and  tastes  for 
something  more  profitable  and  less  liable  to  get 
me  into  trouble.  If  "conduct  is  three  parts 
of  life,"  as  Matthew  Arnold  says,  conduct  itself 
is  determined  by  temperament. 

My  grandmother's  illness  gave  me  my  first 
experience  as  a  sick  nurse.  I  sat  up  two  or  three 
nights  with  her ;  then  she  was  taken  to  the  infirmary, 
where  she  died. 


138  GEORGE  MEEK 

Before  proceeding  to  the  time  when,  alas!  there 
was  no  Ruth  for  me,  perhaps  some  of  my  lady 
readers  would  like  to  know  how  she  used  to 
dress.  She  usually  dressed  in  quiet  colours. 
I  do  not  remember  many  of  her  frocks;  one  I 
know  was  a  medium  brown  with  a  long  wide  strip 
of  gold  braid  running  down  the  side  of  the  skirt. 
With  this  she  wore  a  big  hat  with  piles  and  piles 
of  brown  ribbon  on  it.  I  think  it  must  have  been 
about  this  time  that  blouses  first  became  popular. 
She  is  the  first  woman  I  ever  remember  to  have 
seen  wearing  one.  It  was  a  red  one,  and  with  a 
plain  dark-grey  skirt  she  was  wearing  she  looked 
enchanting  in  it.  They  were  called  "Garibaldis" 
in  those  days.  Another  hat  she  had,  a  pretty  black 
felt  shape,  was  trimmed  with  shot  green  ribbons, 
but  it  had,  to  my  disgust,  a  little  green  stuffed 
bird  on  the  side  of  it.  This  was  the  era  of  "dress 
improvers,"  not  the  big  wire  arrangements  (they 
had  gone  out  a  year  or  two  before),  but  the  little 
pads  worn  under  the  skirt  at  the  back.  The  fur 
capes  which  came  down  to  the  elbow  were  much 
worn  then,  too;  Ruth  had  one  on  when  her  brother 
brought  her  round  to  my  lodgings  on  the  night 
of  the  momentous  interview  after  we  had  been 
discovered. 

There  is  something  more  I  may  as  well  put 
on  record  here  before  I  turn  to  other  subjects. 
Some  years  after  I  was  married,  certainly  after 
my  daughter  Mildred  was  born,  for  some  reason, 


ODDS  AND  ENDS  139 

unknown  to  me  at  the  time,  though  I  had  seen 
and  heard  nothing  of  my  old  sweetheart  for 
years,  she  began  to  haunt  my  thoughts  again. 
I  thought  of  her  continually,  and  the  old  re- 
ligious feeling  came  over  me  again.  After  a 
time  I  heard  that  she  had  returned  to  East- 
bourne and  was  about  to  open  a  shop,  under  the 
name  of  "Ruth  and  Muriel,"  I  think.  Of  course 
it  wasn't  "Ruth  and  Muriel,"  nor  is  Ruth  the 
real  name  of  "my  sweetheart  when  a  boy." 
She  is  still  living — and  one  must  keep  one  or  two 
secrets  to  save  one's  face.  I  was  irresistibly 
tempted  to  write  to  her — to  tell  her  of  myself  and 
mine.  I  reminded  her  of  an  old  dream  she  had 
years  before.  She  dreamt  that  she  saw  me  married 
to  a  woman  whom  she  could  not  recognize,  that  we 
had  a  little  girl,  and  that  she  would  not  speak  to 
me.  That  dream,  I  reminded  her,  had  come  true 
in  every  detail.  I  sent  her  Clarions  and  verses 
from  Omar.  Then,  after  the  shop  had  been 
opened  some  time  I  heard  she  was  married. 

Shortly  afterwards  the  shop  was  closed.  Poor 
Ruth!  I  am  afraid  we  are  neither  of  us  over 
fortunate. 

The  woman  in  Ashford  Road  who  kept  the 
house  in  which  my  grandmother  had  been  taken 
ill  was  thinking  of  going  to  America,  so  I,  having 
sold  all  the  old  lady's  furniture,  took  a  furnished 
lodging  in  a  slightly  better  class  house  in  a  better 
class  street. 


CHAPTER  XV 

A  YEAR  OF  DARK  DAYS 

I  WAS  employed  at  the  Liberal  Club  for  about 
two  years.  Then  a  new  steward  was  appointed, 
a  polished  corner-stone  of  the  particular  religious 
community  to  which  he  belonged.  He  wanted 
me  to  work  fifteen  hours  a  day  for  ten  shillings 
a  week.  I  was  to  sleep  out  and  board  myself 
out  of  that.  I  did  not  like  the  man,  and  he 
wanted  to  get  his  brother  into  my  place.  He 
could  not  discharge  me  on  account  of  my  posi- 
tion in  the  party;  so  I  discharged  myself.  His 
brother  was,  from  his  point  of  view,  an  ideal 
servant.  He  had  been  employed  as  a  potman 
in  London,  working  fifteen  or  sixteen  hours  a 
day  with  only  one  day  off  once  a  month! 

During  the  thirteen  months  which  followed  I 
had  only  two  months'  work.  I  left  the  Club  at 
the  end  of  January,  1890.  My  grandmother  died 
in  the  March.  I  was  parted  from  Ruth  in  the 
May.  It  never  rains  but  it  pours. 

For  some  time,  until  I  got  something  to  do 
to  occupy  my  mind,  I  walked  about  lonely  roads 

140 


A  YEAR  OF  DARK  DAYS      141 

and  fields,  feeling  about  as  miserable  as  any 
poor  devil  need  wish  to.  Religion  was  precious 
little  consolation  to  me,  though  I  continued  to 
go  to  the  chapel  regularly  and  read  pious  books. 
At  the  chapel  I  met  a  retired  civil  servant  who 
lived  near  Eastbourne,  who  befriended  me, 
giving  me  both  money  and  advice.  At  my 
lodgings  I  tried  to  bury  myself  in  the  few  books 
I  had  or  could  get.  I  varied  the  "pious"  read- 
ing by  going  through  Paradise  Lost  and  the 
histories  of  France  and  Germany.  My  friends 
the  Strettons,  while  they  could  not  give  me  work, 
gave  me  an  occasional  meal. 

In  July  and  August  I  assisted  the  Liberal 
agent,  as  usual,  with  the  registration  work, 
looking  up  occupiers  who  had  moved,  getting 
"old  lodgers"  to  renew  their  claims  to  the  vote 
and  "new  lodgers"  to  fill  in  and  sign  claims. 
This  work  generally  lasted  four  weeks  and  three 
days,  and  as  I  was  paid  five  shillings  a  day  it 
was  very  welcome,  as  it  enabled  me  to  get  badly 
needed  boots  and  clothing — to  say  nothing  of 
regular  meals. 

There  had  originally  been  two  registration 
agents  employed  for  the  Eastbourne  division, 
but  one  of  them  had  been  discharged  and  had 
taken  a  cottage  at  a  village  called  Hadlow  Down, 
which  is,  I  believe,  about  twenty  miles  from 
Eastbourne.  From  this  place  he  drove  into 
Eastbourne  two  or  three  times  a  week  in  a  spring 


142  GEORGE  MEEK 

cart  with  butter,  eggs,  poultry,  pork,  rabbits 
and  other  things,  becoming  what  is  known 
locally  as  a  "huckster."  One  day,  just  after  I  had 
finished  the  registration  work — that  would  be 
after  August  20 — I  met  him  near  the  railway 
station,  and  he  suggested  that,  as  I  had  nothing 
to  do,  I  should  have  a  week  or  two  out  in  the 
country  hop-picking.  So  I  gave  up  my  lodgings 
and,  getting  Horace  Stretton  to  warehouse  my 
belongings  in  their  coach-house,  pawned  my 
Sunday  clothes  to  raise  the  fare  to  Heathfield. 

(Speaking  of  the  pawnshop  reminds  me  of 
an  incident  which  occurred  when  I  was  a  boy. 
We  had  just  moved  from  Willingdon  to  East- 
bourne, and  the  annual  Sunday  school  treat  was 
to  be  held  at  the  former  place  on  a  Wednesday. 
I  was  very  anxious  to  go;  it  was,  I  fancy,  the 
week  after  I  was  discharged  from  my  first  situa- 
tion; at  any  rate,  I  had  nothing  to  do  and  my 
mother  had  no  money.  So  she  sent  me  to  pawn 
a  thick  shawl  she  had.  This  was  my  first  ex- 
perience of  the  pawnshop.  I  got  two  shillings 
on  the  shawl,  out  of  which  my  mother  gave  me 
sixpence  to  go  to  the  treat.  As  I  have  had  so 
many  unkind  things  to  say  of  her  I  am  glad  to 
have  recalled  this  incident.  I  remember  that 
when  I  got  to  Willingdon  I  made  myself  ridiculous 
by  affecting  to  talk  like  the  town  people — it  was 
then  the  fad  to  drop  all  the  final  r's — a  fad  some 
people  still  affect.) 


A  YEAH  OF  DARK  DAYS      143 

I  provided  myself  with  a  sixpenny  pork-pie  and 
some  groceries  to  take  out  to  Hadlow  Down,  but 
I  left  the  pork-pie  on  the  corner  of  the  Strettons' 
piano.  From  Heathfield  I  had  a  long  walk  of 
seven  miles  to  Hadlow  Down.  Buxted  is  the 
nearest  railway  station,  but  it  is  much  farther 
from  Eastbourne,  and  consequently  costs  more 
to  reach.  When  I  got  to  the  village  Mrs.  Ashby — 
the  wife  of  the  ex-registration  agent — said  she 
was  sorry,  but  she  could  not  put  me  up.  She 
recommended  me  to  a  neighbouring  cottage, 
where  the  people  let  me  have  a  room,  and  she  sold 
me  some  pork  for  my  Sunday  dinner  on  credit. 
She  was  a  very  fine  soprano  singer  and  had  been 
on  the  stage. 

The  people  to  whom  she  sent  me  had  a  large 
cottage  standing  in  a  very  large  garden,  which 
was  their  own  freehold  property.  The  father 
was  a  bricklayer,  working  on  his  own  account. 
He  was  very  old  and  very  deaf.  There  were 
two  sons  and  two  daughters  away  and  three 
sons  at  home.  The  mother  was  a  homely  old 
country  woman,  a  Calvinist:  for  a  great  many 
years  her  brother-in-law  was  a  leading  minister 
among  the  Strict  Baptists. 

I  did  not  commence  hop-picking  until  the 
following  Thursday.  On  the  Wednesday  I 
walked  down  to  East  Hoathly,  where  there  were 
anniversary  services  at  the  Calvinist  chapel. 
On  the  way  there  I  passed  a  beautiful  house 


144  GEORGE  MEEK 

occupied  by  a  Mr.  Smith,  a  member  of  the  firm 
of  coal  merchants  of  which  Mr.  Compton  Rickett, 
M.P.,  is  a  partner.  I  had  to  walk  back  in  the 
dark  and  it  rained  steadily  all  the  way.  The  road 
wound  through  woods — there  is  a  place  called 
"Black  Boys"  on  the  way,  probably  a  corruption 
of  "Black  Bois,"  as  this  was  formerly  a  very 
heavily  wooded  country  forming  part  of  Ashdown 
Forest — and  the  drip,  drip  of  the  water  from 
leaf  to  leaf  was  weird. 

As  on  my  earlier  experience  at  Wadhurst  and 
Mayfield,  I  picked  hops  on  two  different  farms, 
but  I  earned  hardly  enough  to  keep  myself  and 
pay  my  lodgings.  I  had  to  borrow  half-a- 
sovereign  from  a  friend  in  Eastbourne.  To  get 
this  I  had  to  go  down  by  train,  and  Horace  Stret- 
ton's  wife — he  was  then  married — gave  me  two 
nights'  lodging  and  my  food,  for  which  she  would 
not  let  me  pay  her.  The  friend  who  lent  me  the 
ten  shillings  was  Henry  Bradford,  the  Baptist  min- 
ister, one  of  the  very  few  Christians  I  have  met 
worth  the  name. 

In  spite  of  this  little  trouble,  and  though  I 
was  still  miserable  on  account  of  Ruth,  and  part 
of  the  time  suffered  agonies  from  the  toothache 
which  I  had  contracted  through  breaking  a  tooth 
on  cracking  a  hazel-nut,  the  month  I  spent  in  this 
village  was  an  interesting  time.  The  cottage 
where  I  lodged  stood  on  sloping  ground  facing 
south.  Of  the  three  sons  at  home  the  youngest 


A  YEAR  OF  DARK  DAYS      145 

was  a  school-boy,  the  pet  of  the  family;  the 
second  was  rather  ill-conditioned  and  quarrel- 
some; the  eldest  rather  a  nice  young  fellow, 
who  had  worked  in  Eastbourne;  he  was  fond 
of  shooting,  and  some  years  afterwards  lost  a 
hand  through  an  accident  with  his  gun.  The 
mother,  who  like  the  rest  was  engaged  in  the 
hop  gardens,  wore  a  large  brown  sun-bonnet. 
When  I  went  home  one  night,  when  I  had  been 
there  about  a  week,  I  saw  some  one  wearing  such 
a  big  brown  bonnet  stooping  over  the  stove 
lighting  the  fire.  I  thought  it  was  the  old  lady, 
instead  of  which  it  was  a  very  young  and  very 
handsome  one.  One  of  the  daughters,  the  only 
unmarried  one,  had  come  home  from  service. 

I  give  her  the  name  of  Lois.  She  was  a  fine 
type  of  rustic  beauty,  fair,  full-figured,  a  "Venus 
de  Milo."  She  attracted  me  at  once,  but  not 
enough  then  to  make  me  forget  Ruth.  We  had 
a  few  walks  together;  in  the  retrospect  I  am 
inclined  to  think  her  a  bit  of  a  flirt.  One  walk  we 
had  with  her  youngest  brother  to  see  some  inter- 
esting people  who  lived  in  an  old  cottage  some 
distance  away.  They  had  "seen  better  days"; 
there  were  several  children  nearly  grown  up,  one 
daughter  quite. 

They  had  come  from  Brighton,  where  some 
misfortune  had  befallen  them — I  think  their  father 
had  deserted  them  and  their  mother  to  go  off 
with  another  woman — and  they  stood  at  the 


146  GEORGE  MEEK 

next  bin  to  mine  in  the  hop  gardens.  I  gave, 
or  lent,  one  of  them  a  book  on  astronomy  I  had 
with  me. 

After  Lois  came  home  we  had  some  pleasant 
evenings.  She  brightened  the  place  up;  some 
girl  friends  came  in  occasionally  and  there  was 
some  singing — hymns,  of  course.  I  occupied  a 
room  on  the  ground -floor  opening  on  to  the 
kitchen.  It  had  the  finest  bed  in  it  I  have  ever 
slept  on,  a  great  down  one  into  which  one  seemed 
to  sink.  On  week  days  we  were  up  at  five  in  the 
morning  to  get  to  the  gardens,  where  we  worked 
from  six  in  the  morning  till  half -past  five  at  night. 
I  usually  went  home  very,  very  tired,  but  after  a 
cup  of  tea  and  a  rest  was  fresh  enough  for  a  long 
walk,  gathering  blackberries  or  hazel-nuts. 

Then  followed  a  visit  to  Tunbridge  Wells  in 
search  of  work — a  vain  search,  of  course.  Here 
I  saw  Mr.  Brown's,  the  Eastbourne  Liberal 
agent's  family:  they  lived  at  Southborough,  and 
gave  me  a  nice  tea  when  I  called.  They  were 
Strict  Baptists  like  myself,  and  I  remember  a 
daughter  regretting  that  one  of  her  brothers  had 
"gone  over  to  those  wicked  Socialists."  I  had 
heard  of  only  one  Socialist  previous  to  this,  a 
workman-  who  had  come  to  Eastbourne  for  a 
time  and  had  refused  to  support  the  Liberals. 

From  Tunbridge  Wells  I  tried  to  walk  to 
Hastings,  but  night  coming  on  and  being  penniless 
I  turned  back  to  Wadhurst.  I  don't  think  I  ever 


A  YEAR  OF  DARK  DAYS      147 

felt  more  utterly  despairing  than  I  did  that  night ; 
everything,  in  every  direction,  seemed  quite 
hopeless. 

At  Wadhurst  I  called  upon  a  Rev.  Mr.  Win- 
slow,  a  Calvinist  minister,  a  connection,  I  be- 
lieve, of  the  Forbes- Winslow  family.  He  lent 
me  two  shillings  on  a  book,  Hawker's  Portions, 
I  had  with  me  (Ruth  had  given  me  that  book 
the  previous  year  as  a  birthday  present).  I 
lodged  at  a  coffee-house  in  Wadhurst  that  night 
and  the  following  day  walked  into  Hastings, 
getting  there  very  late  at  night  after  my  cousin 
Hairy  and  his  family  had  gone  to  bed.  But 
he  got  up  and  gave  me  some  supper  and  a  night's 
lodging. 

The  next  day  I  walked  by  way  of  Winchelsea 
and  Rye  to  Lydd.  Across  Romney  Marsh  it 
rained — a  steady  drizzle.  It  was  dark  when  I  got 
into  Lydd.  I  had  no  money,  but  I  sold  a  knife 
or  something  I  had  for  the  price  of  a  bed,  and 
slept  at  a  small  cottage,  leaving  some  religious 
book  I  had  behind,  as  the  people  were  very  kind. 
It  seemed  useless  to  go  on  any  further,  so  I  re- 
turned that  day  to  Hastings  and  the  next  to 
Eastbourne,  walking  all  the  way.  My  old  land- 
lady in  Bridger's  Yard  put  me  up  for  a  few  nights, 
and  Nash,  at  the  "general"  shop  in  South  Street 
let  me  have  some  food  and  tobacco  on  credit. 
The  walk  from  Hastings  into  Eastbourne  was 
memorable.  I  was  hungry,  and  ate  all  the  few 


148  GEORGE  MEEK 

blackberries  I  could  find  on  the  bushes  as  I  crossed 
the  Crumbles.  I  had  no  tobacco,  and  I  burnt  a 
hole  in  a  wooden  pipe  I  had  trying  to  burn  the 
dust  I  could  scrape  from  the  sides. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

I  ADOPT  MY  PROFESSION 

WHATEVER  significance  there  may  be  in  the 
number  thirteen,  I  have  reason  to  remember  it. 
Ruth's  birthday  is  on  the  thirteenth  of  the 
month.  I  was  parted  from  her  on  the  thirteenth 
of  May.  (I  lost  one  of  my  numerous  chairs  on  the 
thirteenth  of  another  May — 1907),  and  I  sank  to 
the  "profession"  of  bathchair-man  on  the  thir- 
teenth of  February  1891,  eighteen  years  ago 
to-morrow!  Also  I  received  the  letter  which 
announced  the  acceptance  of  this  book  by  its 
publishers  on  the  thirteenth  of  November  1909. 

I  say  "sank"  advisedly.  Rightly  or  wrongly, 
I  had  always  considered  bathchair  work  beneath 
me,  and  bathchair-men,  as  a  class,  disreputable. 
Probably  I  was  imbued  with  some  of  Ruth's 
"genteel"  ideas.  I  have  seen  since  that  it  would 
have  been  a  very  good  thing  for  me  if  I  had 
filled  in  my  spare  time  during  the  two  summers 
I  was  at  the  Club  with  a  chair.  There  was  very 
good  money  indeed  to  be  earned  in  those  days, 
and  even  if  my  earnings  had  not  enabled  me  to 

149 


150  GEORGE  MEEK 

get  a  chair  of  my  own,  they  would  have  made 
my  grandmother's  last  days  more  comfortable. 
It  was  quite  the  usual  thing  for  men  to  earn  over 
two  pounds  a  week  all  through  August  and 
September  then.  But  now! 

The  way  I  came  to  take  out  a  licence  at  last 
was  this.  I  knew  an  old  bathchair-man  at  Old 
Town,  a  Liberal  friend  of  mine,  and  while  warn- 
ing me  that  at  that  time  of  the  year  I  could  not 
expect  to  earn  much  money,  he  suggested  that 
it  would  be  better  for  me  to  have  a  try  at  the 
work  than  go  week  after  week  standing  about 
doing  nothing.  Superintendent  Newnam  had 
known  me  for  years,  and  I  readily  obtained  my 
licence.  I  started  with  an  old-fashioned  lever 
spring  chair,  not  a  very  good  one  I  am  afraid, 
but  I  happened  to  get  two  or  three  regular  cus- 
tomers and  did  very  well  the  first  year.  People 
should  only  follow  chair  work  for  one  year,  as 
I  notice  that  almost  every  one  does  better  the 
first  year  than  they  do  afterwards. 

After  a  week  or  two  I  overcame  my  aversion 
to  my  new  employment.  It  was  something  to  do, 
anyway,  and  I  earned  money  nearly  every  day. 
Having  had  to  go  on  short  commons  for  a  long 
time  previously  I  found  it  very  tiring  at  first,  but 
I  did  not  mind  that.  Buoyed  up  with  hope  of 
success,  I  wrote  to  Ruth's  brother  asking  that 
we  might  become  friends  again — not  that  we 
should  be  engaged,  but  that  I  might  see  her  now 


I  ADOPT  MY  PROFESSION     151 

and  then.  These  letters  made  him  very  angry 
and  gave  rise  to  scenes  at  home,  so  her  mother 
told  Ruth  to  write  to  me  making  an  appointment 
with  me  in  Water  Lane.  Here  I  waited  for  her 
late  one  evening,  and  she  came  tripping  along 
like,  as  I  thought,  a  very  fairy.  We  had  a  long 
talk — she  begged  of  me  not  to  write  to  her  brother 
again,  but  to  work  and  wait  patiently,  trusting 
in  God.  It  was  our  very  last  walk  together. 
Later  in  the  year  she,  having  left  the  shop  at 
which  she  worked  the  year  before,  used  to  go 
to  a  house  in  Upperton  Gardens,  where  she  had 
a  private  customer.  She  took  me  quite  by  sur,- 
prise  by  speaking  to  me  one  day  at  the  corner 
of  the  street  where  I  used  to  stand  with  my  chair. 
We  spoke  once  or  twice  more  as  she  was  going  or 
coming  from  this  place;  then  she  told  me  we 
must  n't  speak  any  more,  there  were  too  many 
"newsagents"  about,  and  I  have  never  heard  the 
sound  of  her  voice  since.  I  have  seen  her  once, 
the  day  before  I  attended  the  Tunbridge  Wells 
conference  of  1907,  which  crowned  the  political 
work  I  have  achieved — up  to  now.  I  had  taken 
a  lady  in  my  chair  up  to  the  Old  Town  to  look  at 
the  church.  While  she  was  inside  Ruth  came  out 
of  a  house  opposite  and  paused  a  few  moments  on 
the  pavement  looking  across  at  me.  I  longed  to 
speak  to  her,  but  I  hardly  knew  how  she  would 
receive  me.  I  have  caused  her,  I  am  afraid, 
a  good  deal  of  trouble,  and  I  expected  my  fare  to 


152  GEORGE  MEEK 

come  out  of  the  church  every  moment.  I  know  I 
felt  infinitely  sad.  Then  last  autumn,  when  I 
had  been  very  ill,  I  took  my  little  daughter  one 
Sunday  up  into  South  Fields  for  a  walk.  I  had 
to  walk  very  slowly  on  account  of  my  extreme 
weakness,  I  remember,  and  on  the  way  we  passed 
a  woman  with  a  child  in  long  clothes  in  her  arms. 
I  thought  it  was  Ruth,  but  she  had  a  large  hat  on 
and  held  her  head  down  so  that  I  could  not  see 
her  face. 

During  1891  and  1892  I  still  attended  the 
chapel  regularly.  I  hired  my  first  chair  on  the 
understanding  that  I  should  "pay  in"  a  quarter 
of  my  earnings.  This  often  amounted  to  6s.  6d. 
or  js.  Then  I  hired  a  cee-spring  chair,  for 
which  I  paid  6s.  per  week,  and  left  the  Upperton 
district,  where  the  work  had  slackened,  to  ply 
for  hire  on  the  Front  near  the  Grand  Hotel. 
Here  I  had  a  good  season,  earning,  for  me,  wonder- 
ful money.  I  borrowed  the  money  of  a  local  loan 
society  to  buy  a  chair,  but  I  was  taken  in  over 
it :  it  needed  so  much  repairing  I  had  to  get  rid  of 
it  the  next  year  and  go  on  hiring  again. 

During  my  first  year  at  chair  work  we  had  two 
great  storms  at  Eastbourne:  one  a  blizzard  with 
much  snow  early  in  March;  the  other  a  tremen- 
dous gale  -in  November.  During  the  latter  a 
chimney  blew  down  at  a  house  in  Lismore  Road. 
It  crashed  through  two  floors  and  killed  the  cook 
while  she  was  dishing  up  the  luncheon  in  the 


I  ADOPT  MY  PROFESSION      153 

kitchen  below.  I  was  outside  a  few  minutes  after 
while  they  were  trying  to  get  the  body  out  from 
under  the  debris.  This  was  a  storm  and  no  mis- 
take. It  was  almost  impossible  for  one  to  keep 
one's  footing  in  the  streets. 

I  did  fairly  well  up  to  Christmas.  I  was 
lodging  with  a  man  who  had  the  laziest  woman 
for  a  wife  that  I  have  ever  seen.  Some  years 
afterwards  she  met  with  a  tragic  end.  She  was 
burnt  to  death  while  lying  in  bed  reading  Tit- 
Bits.  Another  landlady  used  to  pawn  her  hus- 
band's clean  linen  for  drink.  Another,  a  member 
of  the  chapel  I  attended,  was  so  particular  one 
did  n't  dare  drop  a  crumb  on  the  floor. 

The  following  year  I  did  indifferently  well  all 
the  spring  with  my  chair.  The  general  election 
"arriving"  in  June  I  was  glad  to  give  it  up  for  a 
time.  I  was  employed  as  clerk  at  the  central 
committee  rooms  at  five  shillings  per  day.  Dur- 
ing this  time  I  suppose  my  religious  scruples 
were  giving  way.  I  know  I  read  Carlyle's  French 
Revolution  and  Eugene  Sue's  Wandering  Jew 
while  at  the  political  work,  though  all  this  year 
I  attended  chapel  regularly  and  did  not  work  on 
Sundays.  If  I  had  customers  who  rode  on  Sun- 
days I  always  got  some  one  else  to  take  them, 
and  lost  two  or  three  thereby.  I  had  been  bap- 
tized the  previous  year  and  made  a  member  of 
the  chapel. 

After  my  last  interview  with  Ruth  I  made  up 


154  GEORGE  MEEK 

my  mind  to  try  to  forget  her  in  the  company 
of  others.  I  walked  out  a  few  times  with  a  cook, 
a  fellow  member  of  the  chapel,  who  gave  me  the 
sack  because  I  would  not  sit  down  in  the  corner 
of  a  field  near  Rodmell  with  her.  Then  Lois 
wrote  to  me  to  visit  her  at  Hadlow  Down  one 
week  end.  She  went  into  service  at  Ivy  House, 
Ore.  Here,  while  I  was  "electioneering,"  and 
afterwards  while  I  was  at  work  in  the  Liberal 
agent's  office,  I  used  to  visit  her  on  Sundays.  I 
am  afraid  I  spent  a  good  deal  of  money  on  her. 
She  was  a  fine-looking  girl  to  be  seen  with,  and 
I  thought  it  worth  while.  We  had  some  fine 
walks  together  about  Hastings. 

Then  she  began  to  have  scruples.  She  had  an 
old  lover  in  Canada,  a  pastry  cook,  and  she  thought 
she  "was  not  doing  right  by  him."  There  was 
another  girl  named  Louie  in  the  house,  a  frail, 
fair  girl,  very  vivacious.  I  transferred  my  affec- 
tions to  her,  but  after  we  had  corresponded  and 
kept  company  for  a  time  she  took  a  fancy  to  a 
postman  and  gave  me  up  in  his  favour.  She 
discovered  afterwards  that  he  was  married. 

The  time  at  the  election  committee  rooms, 
where  I  had  some  enjoyment  in  long  tricycle 
rides  I  had  to  take  into  the  country,  and  the 
fun  we  had  with  the  opposing  party,  with  the 
five  weeks  or  so  in  the  registration  cffice  which 
followed,  made  me  reluctant  to  return  to  the 
chair  work  of  which  I  was  already  heartily  sick, 


I  ADOPT  MY  PROFESSION      155 

But  needs  must  when  the  devil  drives.  I  had 
nothing  else  to  do,  but  I  had  become  unfitted 
for  it,  and  having  only  a  very  poor  chair  to  work 
with  I  made  a  bad  season. 

It  was  about  this  time  I  became  a  Socialist 
definitely.  I  had  a  copy  of  Looking  Backward 
given  me,  as  well  as  Morrison  Davidson's  Old 
Order  and  the  New,  and  my  faith  in  the  Liberal 
party  was  undermined.  Advertisements  in  one 
of  these  books  led  me  to  subscribe  to  the  Clarion, 
Justice  and  the  Workman's  Times.  I  drifted 
farther  and  farther  away  from  orthodox  Liberal- 
ism until,  holding  open-air  meetings  in  the  spring 
of  '93,  at  which  I  advised  my  hearers  to  help 
form  an  I.  L.  P.  group,  I  was  expelled  from  the 
party.  I  had  been  on  the  executive  committee 
and  the  district  council,  and  Mr.  Brown  had 
promised  me  that  had  Admiral  Brand,  the  Liberal 
candidate,  been  returned  at  that  election,  I  should 
have  been  appointed  permanent  assistant  registra- 
tion agent  at  a  good  salary. 

The  winter  of  '92-3  saw  the  decline  of  both 
my  religion  and  morals.  The  morals  went  first. 
Lois  had  just  given  me  my  conge.  I  was  either 
out  of  work  or  doing  very  little.  I  was  intensely 
depressed,  and  I  happened  to  be  alone  with  a  girl 
who  had  been  "chasing"  me.  It  seemed  ironical 
that  while  the  girls  I  wanted — usually  fair  ones 
— eluded  me,  girls  I  did  n't  by  any  means  want 
were  always  after  me,  This  was  one  of  them.  I 


156  GEORGE  MEEK 

"took  advantage"  of  her.  It  was  the  first  time 
I  had  known  a  woman,  and  for  days  afterwards 
I  was  overpowered  with  a  sense  of  shame  and  of 
something  lost. 

I  was  having  a  very  bad  time  in  every  way. 
Try  how  I  would,  failure  and  disappointment  met 
me  in  every  direction.  It  was  to  some  extent  my 
own  fault.  I  had  always  been  so  short  of  money 
that  when  I  did  get  to  earn  fairly  large  sums  I 
could  n't  take  care  of  it.  The  luxury  of  having 
more  than  was  absolutely  necessary  to  keep  body 
and  soul  together  proved  too  much  for  me.  Be- 
sides, even  when  I  was  trying  to  forget  Ruth 
in  the  company  of  other  women,  the  thought  of 
her  rankled. 

My  old  agnosticism  began  to  reassert  itself. 
The  Calvinistic  doctrines  began  to  present  them- 
selves in  all  their  naked  absurdity.  I  began  to 
question  the  justice,  and  afterwards  the  prob- 
ability, of  people  being  brought  into  this  world 
without  their  consent  to  suffer  long  years  of 
worry,  pain  and  misery  here  and  endless  tor- 
ments hereafter.  My  Socialism  made  me  more 
humanitarian,  and  I  wanted  to  live  a  fuller  life 
than  the  bondage  of  religious  tenets  would  per- 
mit. Carlyle  and  Sue  had  whetted  my  appetite 
for  more  secular  literature. 

I  continued  my  daily  prayers  and  my  attend- 
ance at  chapel  for  some  time;  then  I  communi- 
cated my  doubts  to  my  friend  the  deacon  and 


I  ADOPT  MY  PROFESSION      157 

the  minister.  My  letters  were  read  before  the 
assembled  church,  and  I  was  suspended  from  my 
membership.  There  was  some  talk  of,  and  I  had 
hoped  for,  my  becoming  a  minister  in  time.  If  I 
could  have  repressed  my  doubts,  continued  to 
make  a  profession  of  religion,  and  acted  with  a 
little  "worldly  wisdom"  I  could  have  made  my 
way  very  well.  As  it  was  I  lost  some  of  my  best 
friends.  Similarly,  if  I  could  have  concealed 
the  change  in  my  political  views  and  remained 
with  the  Liberals  my  knowledge  and  experience 
of  political  work  would  doubtless  have  procured 
me  some  advancement  in  time. 

In  the  following  spring  I  made  another  attempt 
to  get  work  in  London,  but  failed.  I  sank  so 
low  whilst  I  was  there  I  had  to  go  into  a  Sal- 
vation Army  "elevator,"  and  a  horrible  place  I 
found  it.  I  got  in  touch  with  the  S.  D.  P.  and 
the  Fabian  Society,  however,  during  this  visit; 
for  the  latter  I  sold  pamphlets  at  the  Eight-Hour 
Day  Demonstration  on  May  Day.  John  Burns 
and  G.  B.  Shaw  were  speaking  there.  I  paid 
the  latter  the  money  I  had  received  for  the  pam- 
phlets, and  he  put  it  into  his  pocket  without 
looking  at  it.  And  I  was  literally  starving!1  A 
distant  cousin  helped  me  to  return  to  Eastbourne, 
where  I  organized  a  local  Fabian  Society  and 

1  A  friend  thinks  this  reference  to  G.  B.  S.  unfair.  It  is  not 
intended  to  be  so.  The  point  is,  I  might  have  kept  some  of  the 
coppers  and  he  would  not  have  known. 


158  GEORGE  MEEK 

several  open-air  meetings.  At  these  I  had  as 
principal  speakers  H.  R.  Smart  and  John  Ward. 
A  local  publican,  accompanied  by  a  lot  of  drunken 
roughs,  tried  to  break  up  one  of  our  meetings  on 
the  Wish  Tower  grounds.  He  has  since  lost 
his  licence — through  no  good  conduct,  you  may 
be  sure. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

THE  CURSE   OF  CASUAL   EMPLOYMENT 

WITH  short  intervals  when  I  could  get  no  chair 
to  draw,  I  have  been  at  chair  work  ever  since,  with 
varying  luck.  I  have  had  some  good  customers — 
the  late  Hon.  Walter  Bateman  Hanbury,  with 
whom  I  earned  seven  pounds  in  a  fortnight,  and 
his  aunt,  Lady  Northwick  of  Worcestershire. 
These  were  both  ideal  kindly  aristocrats,  consid- 
erate, genial,  paying  well.  I  shall  never  forget  the 
Hon.  W.'s  pleasing  pensive  face.  He  had  been  for 
some  years  ranching  in  South  America.  He  had 
entirely  lost  the  use  of  his  legs,  and  had  to  be  lifted 
in  and  out  of  the  chair.  He  employed  me  for  two 
seasons.  Then  his  lady  friends  persuaded  him  that 
I  was  not  strong  enough,  or  could  not  see  well 
enough,  or  charged  too  much — anyway  the  fol- 
lowing summer  he  brought  his  own  private  chair 
and  his  man  had  to  draw  him  about. 

He  gave  me  the  best  dog  I  ever  had,  an  Aber- 
deen terrier.  But  more  of  this  quaint  animal 
later  on. 

I  have  had  other  good  customers  from  whom 
159 


160  GEORGE  MEEK 

for  a  time — a  few  days,  or  a  few  weeks  it  may 
be — I  have  earned  good  money.  But  these  are 
few  and  far  between.  As  a  rule  the  life  is  a  long 
state  of  worry,  debt  and  despair.  Day  after  day, 
week  after  week,  always  "hoping  for  something 
to  turn  up"  which  seldom  or  never  does  turn  up, 
one  drags  on,  getting  deeper  in  debt,  and  in  con- 
sequence a  worse  name  with  chair-owners,  land- 
lords, tradesmen. 

Till  the  motor  came  we  could  look  forward  to 
doing  fairly  well  in  August  and  September,  and 
so  being  able  to  pay  off  old  scores.  But  now  we 
do  rather  worse  during  the  summer  season  than 
at  other  times.  I  am  writing  this  on  the  igth  of 
August  1908.  During  the  month  so  far  I  have 
earned  only  one  casual  shilling.  I  have  a  small 
contract  job,  but  I  am  free  from  twelve  o'clock 
every  day.  And  the  other  men  are  standing  about 
in  glum  hopelessness. 

Sometimes  there  are  a  few  jobs  at  the  Grand 
Hotel,  then  one  will  get  up  there  before  six  o'clock 
to  get  "first  turn,"  standing  there  till  eleven  be- 
fore there  is  any  likelihood  of  work.  I  have  done 
this  many  a  time  in  the  depth  of  winter.  The  rule 
is  that  if  you  get  out  early  in  the  morning  to  get 
a  stand,  you  must  not  leave  your  chair  for  any 
length  of  time  until  dinner  time.  Some  of  the 
bounders,  however,  do  not  keep  this  rule;  they 
slip  away  for  an  hour  or  so  to  breakfast.  One  of 
them  was  fined  for  that  last  autumn.  The  police, 


CASUAL  EMPLOYMENT       161 

however,  only  worry  us  by  fits  and  starts.  Some 
one  goes  to  the  Town  Hall  and  complains  that 
they  found  some  chair  unattended  when  they 
wanted  to  hire  it;  then  we  have  to  be  careful  for 
a  week  or  two.  As  a  rule  we  do  not  leave  our 
chairs  for  long:  we  are  most  of  us  too  anxious  to 
get  work.  Occasionally  a  man  having  extra  money 
from  some  source  or  other  will  leave  his  chair  to 
sit  in  a  public-house,  but  this  does  not  occur  very 
often.  As  a  rule — I  have  noticed  it  hundreds  of 
times — one  may  stand  by  one's  chair  for  hours 
without  moving  and  get  no  call,  then  directly  one 
goes  away,  even  if  it  is  only  for  a  few  minutes,  a 
customer  comes  along.  It  is  part  of  the  general 
cussedness  of  things. 

If  you  would  know  the  horror  of  black  despair 
go  out  with  a  bathchair  day  after  day,  with  chair- 
owner  or  landlord  worrying  you  for  rent,  food 
needed  at  home,  and  get  nothing.  Stare  till  your 
eyes  ache;  pray  with  aching  heart  to  a  God  whom 
you  ultimately  curse  for  His  deafness.  And  this 
not  for  a  few  weeks,  but  year  after  year. 

Among  the  chair-men  I  have  known  since  I  first 
began  to  work  at  the  calling  seven  have  gone  mad, 
many  have  taken  to  drink,  others  have  died  in 
the  workhouse  or  are  there  still.  The  work  de- 
moralizes every  one  in  some  way.  It  sets  man 
against  man.  Some  will  do  the  meanest  things  to 
get  work  away  from  others.  For  instance,  men 
have  gone  to  my  customers  and  told  them  I 


162  GEODGE  MEEK 

could  not  see,  or  that  I  was  a  Socialist,  or  that  I 
drank.  It  is  quite  a  common  thing  for  me  to 
get  customers  and  suddenly  lose  them.  One  of 
the  men  tried  to  get  the  contract  work  I  was 
doing  last  year  away  from  me  by  telling  the  lady 
I  was  a  Socialist,  but  she  happened  to  be  that  rara 
avis  a  sensible  woman  and  took  no  notice  of  it. 
In  fact,  she  gave  me  some  of  Mr.  Wells 's  books, 
besides  some  of  the  R.  P.  A.  cheap  reprints. 

While  demanding  the  strength  of  a  man,  chair 
work  does  not  enable  him  to  live  and  pay  his  way 
honestly,  even  if  he  has  a  chair  of  his  own,  un- 
less he  has  some  other  source  of  income.  It  is 
suitable  for  pensioners  or  those  who  can  find  em- 
ployment at  house  or  other  work  in  their  spare 
time.  These  jobs  used  to  be  common  years  ago, 
but  since  Germans  are  cheap  and  have  become 
commonly  employed  by  boarding-  and  lodging- 
house  keepers,  they  are  not  to  be  had.  Reservists 
in  the  German  army  are  being  maintained  here, 
and  they  keep  Englishmen  out  of  employment 
in  towns  like  this  where  there  are  hundreds  of 
unemployed.  They  sleep  in  the  pantry  with  the 
food,  the  scullery  or  even  the  coal-cellar.  Some 
of  them  get  up  early  in  the  summer-time  and 
bike  round  the  country.  If  ever  they  have  oc- 
casion to  use  it,  they  will  have  greater  knowledge 
of  our  roads  than  we  have  ourselves. 

Since  I  first  began  work  as  a  chair-man  I  have 
done  my  level  best  to  get  additional  work.  I  did 


CASUAL  EMPLOYMENT       163 

the  housework  of  two  schools  during  one  year — 
while  the  South  African  war  was  on.  But  some 
one  else  wanted  the  work,  and  offered  to  do  it 
for  less  money.  Then  I  had  a  turn  (Levant  les 
scenes  at  the  local  theatre.  I  have  tried  window- 
cleaning,  everything  I  could  think  of  to  fill  in 
the  blank  hours,  but  always  some  one  else  has 
wanted  the  work  and  edged  me  out  of  it.  East- 
bourne is  one  of  the  loveliest  pleasure  towns  in 
England.  It  is  the  paradise  of  the  idle  and  some- 
times vicious  rich,  the  rest-place  of  jaded  well- 
paid  workers;  but  it  is  a  hell  to  the  poor  who  try 
to  live  in  it  by  casual  labour. 

In  my  early  chair  days  our  fare  was  a  shilling 
per  hour.  We  used  to  charge  one-and-six  where 
we  could  get  it,  but  we  were  liable  to  be  taken 
from  our  stands  and  paid  off  with  a  shilling.  But 
in  those  days  there  was  more  demand  for  us,  and 
we  made  our  own  terms  when  we  could. 

Our  wooden-headed  town  council  objected. 
Of  course  we  have  a  wooden-headed  set  of  town 
councillors,  or  we  should  not  be  like  other  bor- 
oughs. So  I  called  a  meeting  of  the  chair-men 
and  we  organized  ourselves  into  a  union,  each 
man  paying  a  penny  a  week.  We  held  meetings, 
worried  and  threatened  the  obsolete  lot  of  pre- 
historic specimens  who  ruled  the  town,  until  they 
gave  in.  I  have  gratefully  to  acknowledge  the 
help  of  one  councillor,  a  local  architect,  a  Calvinist 
and  a  gentleman.  A  year  or  two  later  when  he 


164  GEORGE  MEEK 

had  to  stand  for  re-election  he  was  defeated. 
Some  of  my  lovely  fellow  chair-men  voted  for 
his  opponent  because  he  was  a  Conservative.  I 
suppose  some  rabid  politicians  would  give  their 
suffrages  to  Old  Nick  in  opposition  to  St.  Michael 
if  he  ran  for  their  party. 

To  the  ordinary  workman  one  shilling  or  one- 
and-sixpence  per  hour  may  sound  extravagantly 
high  pay.  He  must  bear  in  mind  that,  taking 
the  weather  and  slack  times  into  consideration, 
if  we  do  on  an  average  two  hours'  work  a  day  we 
are  very  lucky  indeed.  And  then  if  we  hire  our 
chairs  there  are  four  or  five  shillings  a  week  to  pay 
for  them,  and  if  they  belong  to  us  it  costs  some- 
thing for  coach-house  and  repairs. 

The  chair-rent  was  originally  six  shillings  for 
the  summer,  four  shillings  for  the  winter  per  week. 
An  agitation  which  I  joined  but  did  not  lead  got 
the  summer  rent  reduced  to  five  shillings.  Four 
shillings  all  the  year  round  or  sixpence  a  day 
would  be  amply  sufficient  to  cover  cost  of  repairs, 
coach-house,  etc.,  and  leave  a  fair  profit,  because 
no  one  buys  a  brand  new  bathchair  to  let  out. 
They  are  usually  old  and  half  worn  out.  I  know 
cases  in  which  the  annual  rent  exceeds  the  first 
cost  of  the  chair  to  the  owner. 

Naturally  the  owners  are  a  pretty  hard  lot. 
They  could  not  continue  to  own  chairs  and  make 
them  pay  if  they  were  not.  I  have  gone  to  the 
coach-house  and  found  the  handle  taken  off  my 


CASUAL  EMPLOYMENT       165 

chair  when  I  have  been  less  than  five  shillings 
behind  with  the  rent.1  They  do  not  give  you 
notice.  They  slip  round  to  the  coach-house  early 
in  the  morning  or  late  at  night  after  you  have 
put  the  chair  away,  take  the  handle  off,  and  then 
the  next  day  go  and  brag  about  it  amongst  the 
men,  to  show  how  big  they  are  and  to  intimi- 
date others  who  may  be  working  for  them.  One 
day  one  of  them  served  me  this  trick.  It  had 
been  a  very  dull  time,  and  I  had  my  daughter 
lying  ill  with  whooping-cough.  Instead  of  pay- 
ing him  that  week,  what  money  I  had  earned  had 
gone  for  medicine  and  doctor's  fees.  I  told  him 
so,  and  he  said  he  couldn't  help  my  sick  child: 
he  wanted  his  rent.  Another  one,  when  I  told 
him  that  my  boy  was  dead,  exclaimed,  "A  good 
job  too !  Now  you  '11  be  able  to  pay  for  your  chair. ' ' 
I  had  paid  that  man  over  thirty  pounds  for  a  chair 
that  cost  him  only  twenty -five,  and  I  owed  him 
less  than  thirty  shillings.  They  always  remember 
what  you  owe,  but  forget  what  you  have  paid. 

One  man  who  had  my  nose  to  the  grindstone 
in  that  way  was  a  coach-builder.  I  had  returned 
from  my  tour  on  behalf  of  the  Socialist  movement 
to  find  every  chair  in  the  town  let.  I  was  out  of 

1  Since  writing  the  above  I  hear  that  Judge  Emden  has  de- 
cided in  the  Tunbridge  Wells  County  Court  that  this  is  illegal 
and  awarded  damages  to  a  chair- man  against  a  chair-owner 
guilty  of  it.  When  the  chairs  are  hired  by  the  week,  a  week's 
notice  should  be  given  either  side. 


166  GEORGE  MEEK 

work  three  or  four  weeks,  but  though  my  wife 
kept  me  out  of  her  poor  earnings  as  an  ironer,  I 
was  not  sufficiently  demoralized  to  want  to  keep 
on  living  on  her.  So  I  searched  and  searched  till 
I  heard  of  his  chair.  He  left  things  in  the  hands 
of  his  sons,  being  too  old  to  manage  them  him- 
self. There  were  four  of  them.  The  eldest,  a 
quiet,  dreamy  painter,  fond  of  doing  artistic  work ; 
the  others,  one,  the  smith,  a  member  of  our  fash- 
ionable church  choir,  another  an  ardent  Sal- 
vationist, the  last  the  book-keeper.  The  chair 
was  an  unpopular  one:  one  of  the  Brighton  shape 
which  may  be  de  rigueur  in  Brighton,  but  is  not 
well  thought  of  here. 

Anyway  it  was  my  only  chance,  so  I  took  it. 
I  had  been  agitating  for  lower  chair-rents  for 
some  time,  and  the  owners  generally  had  made 
a  dead  set  against  me.  Besides,  I  owed  most  of 
them  a  few  shillings.  Having  paid  nearly  two 
hundred  pounds  in  rent  during  the  past  seven- 
teen years,  ten  pounds  would  cover  all  my 
liabilities  to  them. 

The  coach-builder  expected  me  to  pay  just  the 
same  rent  for  this  chair  as  though  it  had  been 
one  of  the  smart  popular  Bath  type.  However, 
I  did  n't,  and  indeed  I  could  n't  keep  him  paid 
regularly.  The  book-keeping  son  and  the  smith 
kept  me  pretty  well  worried  between  them.  At 
last  it  happened  I  got  some  contract  work,  ten 
shillings  per  week  for  one  hour  a  day.  After  a 


CASUAL  EMPLOYMENT       167 

time,  as  it  appeared  likely  to  last,  I  suggested 
that  the  lady  should  buy  the  chair  for  me,  and 
instead  of  me  paying  rent  for  it  she  should  stop 
four  shillings  per  week  out  of  my  money  until 
it  should  have  been  paid  for,  which  she  did.  Un- 
fortunately she  was  only  able  to  get  out  once 
a  day,  and  the  money  I  received  was  necessarily 
inadequate  to  meet  my  ordinary  expenses,  but 
she  was  a  kind,  genial  old  lady,  and  her  daughters 
and  the  housekeeper,  who  transacted  all  the  busi- 
ness, were  very  kind  to  me.  Unfortunately  it 
did  not  last.  I  fell  ill  and  the  lady  moved  to 
Brighton,  so  they  very  considerately  repaid  me 
the  few  pounds  I  had  paid  on  the  chair  and  it 
was  sold. 

Unfortunately  at  the  time  of  writing  I  am  still 
cursed  with  this  casual  employment.  If  there 
was  a  God  I  would  pray  earnestly  and  fervently 
that  He  would  save  every  man  and  woman  who 
reads  this  from  that  curse.  Better  be  dead  and 
buried  out  of  the  way  than  live  so.  Blessed  are 
the  dead!  they  are  no  longer  hungry,  nor  have 
they  rent  to  pay.  Other  workers  in  Eastbourne 
— porters,  cabmen,  taxi-drivers  and  so  on — lead 
similar  lives.  A  company  came  here  recently  to 
run  taxi-cabs.  I  envied  the  men  who  could  see 
to  drive  motors,  but  not  for  long.  These  poor 
devils  have  to  pay  in  seventy -five  per  cent,  of 
their  earnings,  and  the  rest  is  swallowed  up 
pretty  well  in  garage  fees.  Do  you  wonder  I  am 


168  GEORGE  MEEK 

a  Socialist?  Only  by  the  well-ordered  combina- 
tion of  the  workers  as  a  class-conscious  body 
grounded  scientifically  can  we  ever  arrive  at  a 
better  condition  of  things. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

THE   BRIGHTER   SIDE  OF  CHAIR-WORK 

I  HAVE  told  you  some  of  the  sorrows  of  our 
occupation,  and  of  one  or  two  of  my  decent  cus- 
tomers who  made  things  well  for  me.  Now  for 
a  time  I  must  try  to  tell  you  of  the  brighter  side, 
which  balances  to  some  extent  the  dark.  Hitherto, 
I  do  not  mind  telling  you,  I  have  written  under 
great  pressure,  and  with  a  certain  amount  of 
mental  and  physical  distress.  I  would  be  glad 
and  grateful  if  I  could  finish  this  work  leisurely 
and  free  from  worry.  After  all,  I  am  trying  to 
tell  a  man 's  story  of  his  own  life  and  experience 
as  simply  and  truthfully  as  I  can. 

What,  then,  has  been  the  bright  side  of  my 
work?  By  nature  I  am  happy  and  fond  of  en- 
joyment. I  sing  and  tell  stories,  love  music, 
humour  and  good  books.  Mein  Gottl  but  if  I 
had  only  a  fair  chance  of  living  a  decent  life, 
how  I  should  live! 

When  things  go  well  (as  they  do  sometimes), 
we  can  go  out  in  the  morning,  knowing  we  have 
a  decent  day's  work  before  us,  free  from  worry. 

169 


170  GEORGE  MEEK 

If  we  have  engagements  we  need  not  hurry  out 
early,  we  can  take  our  time;  there  is  no  master 
or  foreman  to  interfere  with  us. 

Sometimes  we  get  customers  for  whom  it  is 
a  real  pleasure  to  work.  I  remember  several 
very  nice  people.  There  was  one  elderly  gentle- 
man who  suffered  with  sciatica.  He  was  very 
wealthy,  and  always  paid  two  shillings  for  every 
hour.  He  had  a  very  pleasant  manner,  and 
would  sit  by  the  sea  and  talk  with  his  chair-man 
in  a  kindly,  unaffected  way.  Then  there  are  the 
surprises  fate  springs  upon  one.  I  had  been 
doing  very  badly  for  a  long  while,  when  I  got 
the  customer  of  whom  I  have  been  writing.  Some- 
thing induced  me  to  move  from  one  unlikely  stand 
to  another  at  an  unlikely  time  of  the  morning, 
but  the  under-gardener,  who  had  been  sent  to 
get  a  chair,  called  me  from  this  stand  because  I 
was  by  myself,  and,  in  consequence,  I  had  six 
weeks'  very  good  regular  work,  earning  over 
two  pounds  a  week.  At  another  time — in  De- 
cember— I  had  waited  on  a  stand  near  the  Grand 
Hotel  till  nearly  twelve  o'clock.  Thinking  I 
would  try  another  at  the  end  of  Wilmington 
Square,  I  made  for  it  by  way  of  Jevington  Gar- 
dens. Here  I  was  hailed  by  a  young  lady  and 
taken  to  Elsing  Lodge,  a  house  in  Grange  Road, 
to  take  her  mother  out.  I  had  that  lady  once 
or  twice  a  day  for  nearly  two  months.  Her  hus- 
band had  been,  at  one  time,  head-master  of 


BRIGHT  SIDE  OF  CHAIR-WORK  171 

Cheltenham  School,  and  she  had  a  young  daughter 
— a  girl  of  fifteen  or  so — who  was  a  clever  "trick" 
bicycle  rider. 

One  evening  when  the  late  King — then  Prince 
of  Wales — came  to  Eastbourne  to  open  a  cattle 
show,  a  lady  engaged  me  to  take  her  to  see  him 
pass  from  the  railway-station  to  Compton  Place, 
where  he  was  staying  for  the  week-end  with  the 
late  Duke  of  Devonshire.  We  were  only  an 
hour  and  a  half  gone,  but  when  I  took  the  lady 
back  to  her  house  she  said,  "I  must  give  you 
something  extra,  as  this  is  a  special  occasion." 
She  put  some  money  in  my  hand,  which  I  did 
not  look  at  until  I  had  got  back  on  the  stand. 
I  thought  it  was  probably  two  and  threepence 
or  half-a-crown ;  but  when  I  came  to  look  at  it 
I  found  it  was  six  shillings. 

One  Sunday  in  June,  a  few  years  ago,  I  had 
stood  from  eight  in  the  morning  till  eight  at 
night  on  the  corner  of  Wilmington  Square  with- 
out earning  a  penny.  I  was  pretty  low-spirited. 
I  was  hiring  my  chair  from  a  very  hard  man,  and 
I  had  no  money  for  him  or  myself  either.  As  I 
pulled  off  the  stand  to  go  home,  a  gentleman 
called  to  me.  I  hoped  he  wanted  to  engage  me, 
but  he  only  wanted  a  light. 

"Very  busy?"  he  asked. 

"No,"  I  said;  "I  'm  sorry  to  say  I  Ve  been  here 
since  eight  o  'clock  this  morning  and  have  n't  had 
a  job." 


172  GEORGE  MEEK 

"That's  hard  lines,"  he  said;  "here's  half-a- 
crown  for  you.  Are  you  married? " 

"Yes,"  I  said,  thanking  him. 

"Any  children?"  he  asked. 

"Yes,"  I  said;  "one  little  girl." 

"Oh,"  he  said,  putting  his  hand  in  his  pocket, 
"here's  another  five  shillings!" 

At  another  time — this,  too,  was  in  June — I  had 
not  been  off  for  five  days,  and  they  were  fine 
days,  too.  My  wife  was  working  at  a  laundry 
where  she  could  not  get  her  wages  till  Monday 
or  Tuesday.  On  the  Saturday  afternoon  she 
came  up  to  me  on  the  front,  near  Lansdowne 
Terrace,  to  see  if  I  had  the  money  to  get  our 
Sunday's  dinner.  When  she  found  I  had  had 
no  work  I  suppose  she  looked  blue;  anyway,  a 
gentleman  came  up  to  us  and  asked  us  what  our 
trouble  was.  We  told  him  frankly,  and  he  gave 
us  seven  and  sixpence. 

Once,  at  the  end  of  a  bad  January,  I  was  called 
to  a  house  in  Wilmington  Square  to  take  a  lady 
out.  She  took  a  fancy  to  my  chair,  and  I  had 
her  every  day  for  a  week,  earning  over  two 
pounds.  This  was  Mrs.  Inman,  of  the  great 
steamship  company  in  one  of  whose  vessels  I 
had  crossed  to  New  York.  As  the  author  of  The 
Blue  Moon  is  so  fond  of  saying,  "You  never  can 
tell." 

There  have  been  other  good  customers  besides 
those  I  have  mentioned.  There  was  Mr.  W , 


BRIGHT  SIDE  OF  CHAIR- WORK  173 

who  paid  with  a  princely  hand,  but  who  has 
since  lost  his  money,  and,  I  believe,  died  in  an 
asylum.  There  were  many  other  ladies  and 
gentlemen  who  treated  me  well.  Chief  of  these 
is  Mr.  0 ,  the  head  of  a  great  industrial  con- 
cern, who  has  befriended  me  again  and  again 
when  I  have  been  in  need.  Some  day,  when  I 
am  free  from  this  morass  of  poverty — if  I  ever 
am — I  will  write  more  freely  of  him. 

And  the  nurses.  I  must  not  forget  the  nurses, 
bless  them!  with  their  cheerful  faces  and  genial 
ways.  First  there  was  a  great  Scotswoman,  with 
rich  blond  hair,  in  attendance  on  a  poor  frail  girl 
of  sixteen  who  had  overgrown  herself.  She  was  a 
symphony  in  living  flesh,  glowing,  kindly,  sunny. 
Then  I  remember  a  little  red-haired  fairy  of  an 
Irish  nurse,  a  little  thing  who  flitted  about  doing 
things  and  doing  everything  well — cheerful,  dainty. 
She  was  in  company  with  one  of  the  alleged  "smart 
set, "  a  woman  who  wanted  to  flaunt  up  and  down 
the  parade  in  her  chiffon  and  feathers  making 
eyes  at  every  one  and  talking  silly.  Showing  off, 
anxious  only  to  be  looked  at  and  admired,  a 
poseur  of  poseurs.  This  nurse  was  strong,  and 
used  to  tell  her  patient  not  to  be  or  talk  so  silly. 

I  have  not  met  a  bad  or  disagreeable  nurse. 
Will  the  profession  accept  my  kind  respects? 
When  I  come  to  die,  which  I  suppose  it  is  just 
possible  I  shall  do  some  day,  let  me  have  a  nurse 
near  me  who  has  been  in  long  training.  I  want 


174  GEORGE  MEEK 

neither  doctor  nor  parson.  The  first  know  little 
of  what  they  profess  to  know,  the  latter  nothing. 

And  one  gets  always  the  fresh  air. 

If  these  memories  are  not  finished  artistically, 
and  if  they  seem  to  jangle,  you  must  bear  in 
mind  that  I  am  writing  them  in  the  intervals 
allowed  me  by  my  trade.  I  am  not  sitting  at 
rest.  I  have  a  great  chair  weighing  about  three 
hundredweight  to  draw,  and  I  am  not  strong. 

The  chair  I  had  last  year  was  in  a  frightful 
condition  when  it  was  bought  for  me,  but,  hav- 
ing re-lined  the  body  and  varnished  it,  I  made  it 
quite  passable.  Some  of  the  men  varnish  their 
own  chairs,  and  make  an  awful  mess  of  it.  Owing 
to  hints  received  from  a  coach-painter  or  two,  I 
did  mine  fairly  well  for  an  amateur.  To  those 
who  wish  to  use  carriage- varnish,  get  all  the  old 
varnish  off  with  pumice-powder,  then  get  every 
grain  of  the  pumice-powder  off.  Begin  at  the 
bottom,  so  that  your  varnish  flows  downward, 
covering  your  brush-marks.  It  must  be  done  in 
a  warm,  dustless  place,  and  should  be  on  a  bright, 
sunny  day. 

However,  my  advice  to  those  who  feel  inclined 
to  be  bathchair-men  is  like  Punch's  advice  to 
those  about  to  marry.  You  had  better  go  into  the 
workhouse,  or  do  something  to  get  yourself  a  long 
spell  of  penal  servitude. 

I  have  met  but  few  chair-men  of  whom  I  could 
make  friends.  Those  I  have  to  speak  of  in  another 


BRIGHT  SIDE  OF  CHAIR-WORK  175 

chapter  I  knew  in  my  younger  days,  and  their 
friendship  was  a  doubtful  blessing.  One  or  two 
stand  out  above  the  rest,  however.  There  is 
one  little  religious  chap  who,  in  spite  of  his  limi- 
tations, is  a  thoroughly  good  one.  They  are,  on 
the  whole,  a  queer  lot:  broken-down  tradesmen, 
retired  soldiers  or  sailors,  men  of  every  de- 
scription who  have  failed  at  everything  else,  or 
have  been  chair-men  so  long  they  are  unfitted 
for  any  other  calling.  Though  there  are  excep- 
tions, "once  a  chair-man,  always  a  chair-man" 
holds  good  in  most  cases.  Two  of  our  queerest 
specimens  we  owe  to  the  petite  bourgeoisie.  One 
is  a  qualified  chemist,  the  other  a  grocer;  but 
while  one  has  always  been  a  teetotaler,  and  the 
other  nearly  so,  they  have  some  characteristics 
in  common.  They  are  always  in  trouble.  They 
can  do  nothing  efficiently — except  talk — not  even 
shut  a  door  after  them.  Any  one  more  hope- 
lessly helpless  and  futile  it  would  be  difficult  to 
find. 

It  has  been  my  habit  for  a  good  many  years 
to  stand  at  the  corner  of  Wilmington  Square. 
Here  there  are  a  number  of  luggage-porters, 
most  of  whom,  as  a  rule,  earn  more  money  than 
we  do,  and  have  often  made  me  regret  not  be- 
coming a  porter  instead  of  a  chair-man.  But 
they  are  not  always  "flush."  One  winter  I  re- 
member, on  a  bitterly  cold  day,  there  were  four 
of  us — two  chair-men  and  two  porters — standing 


176  GEORGE  MEEK 

about  that  corner.  We  had  been  there  all  day, 
and  had  n't  the  price  of  a  drink  between  us,  when 
a  gentleman  came  along,  and  "Bummer" — one 
of  the  porters — went  up  to  him  and  asked  him 
how  he  was  "fixed  for  coppers."  "All  right,"  he 
said.  "Let  's  see;  there's  four  of  you,"  and  he 
gave  "Bummer"  sixpence.  It  was  the  Chief 
Constable! 


CHAPTER  XIX 
"DEVANT  LES  SCENES" 

ONE  night,  about  nine  months  after  I  was  mar- 
ried, I  was  sitting  in  the  old  bar  at  the  Devonshire 
Park  drinking  a  glass  of  stout,  and  wondering 
where  I  was  going  to  find  my  week's  chair-rent, 
when  Frank,  the  property-master  at  the  ad- 
joining theatre,  came  in  and  asked  if  any  one 
there  would  like  a  job  "supering. "  I  had  agreed 
to  pay  six  shillings  a  week  for  the  chair  I  was 
drawing  at  the  time,  and  though  it  was  in  May, 
it  being  the  year  when  the  water  went  wrong 
at  Eastbourne,  things  were  very,  very  quiet.  So 
I,  and  a  luggage-porter  who  happened  to  be  there, 
promptly  volunteered. 

The  play  was  The  New  Barmaid — one  of  the 
first,  if  not  the  first,  of  the  musical  comedies 
which  was  being  produced  at  the  Devonshire 
Park  Theatre.  In  the  first  act  we  appeared  as 
policemen:  it  was  our  duty  to  "raid"  a  club 
and  arrest  a  number  of  young  ladies  dressed 
unconventionally,  but  very  neatly,  in  short  dress- 
jackets,  black  satin  knickers  and  black  stock- 

12  I77 


178  GEORGE  MEEK 

ings,  who  entered  into  the  spirit  of  the  thing  by 
knocking  our  helmets  off  and  generally  ill-using  us, 
thus  anticipating  the  "new  women"  of  to-day. 
My  own  particular  amazon,  who  looked  re- 
markably well  even  at  close  quarters  in  her 
boyish  dress,  must  have  been  an  athlete — she  sent 
my  heavy  helmet  across  the  footlights  into  the 
orchestra  with  one  blow  at  each  performance.  In 
the  second  act  we  simply  lolled  at  the  back  of  the 
stage  in  somewhat  dingy  boating  gear.  Neither 
at  this  time  nor  subsequently  have  I  ever  experi- 
enced "stage  fright"  or  nervousness  before  the 
audience,  though  once,  when  I  had  a  line  to 
speak  with  Norman  V.  Norman's  company  in 
Nell Gwynn,  I  "dried  up. " 

The  following  week  I  was  given  a  small  speak- 
ing part  in  a  curtain-raiser  called  Before  the  Dawn, 
which  preceded  the  performance  of  The  Late  Mr. 
Costello.  Dressed  as  a  coachman,  I  had  to  rush 
on  the  stage  and  apologize  to  a  poor  tramp  for 
having  run  over  him.  But  I  had  a  good  deal  of 
worry  on  my  mind  that  week,  and  could  n't  get 
much  verve  into  my  performance. 

After  this  it  was  some  years  before  I  went 
"behind  the  scenes"  again.  Then  one  night  one 
of  the  dressers  had  failed  to  turn  up,  and  I  was 
engaged  in  that  capacity.  This  was  for  Florodora, 
and  I  had  the  "chorus  gentlemen"  to  look  after. 
Some  of  these  were  certainly  not  without  some 
qualifications  for  the  title  of  "gentlemen,"  but 


DEVANT  LES  SCENES          179 

one  of  them  was  about  the  most  completely 
shameless  blackguard  I  ever  struck. 

The  following  week  I  was  promoted  to  the 
charge  of  the  "second  principals"  in  the  Belle  of 
New  York.  These  were  a  decent  lot  of  boys. 
Then  I  was  put  on  as  principal  dresser,  with 
Henry  Neville  to  attend  to — one  of  the  best  I  met 
during  my  three  years  at  the  theatre.  I  had  the 
pleasure  of  dressing  him  on  two  visits,  and  if  all 
actors  were  like  him  and  Sidney  Brough,  and 
a  few  more,  the  "dresser's"  lot  would  be  an  easy 
and  a  happy  one. 

Sometimes  during  these  three  years  I  "dressed, " 
sometimes  "supered,"  and  now  and  then  acted  as 
"property  man. "  I  did  not  like  the  late  hours,  the 
stuffy  dressing-rooms,  or  some  of  the  actors,  but 
the  supplementary  money  I  earned  was  welcome. 
I  was  more  often  than  not  in  hot  water  with  some- 
body— the  "ladies'  "  dresser  if  I  got  more  in  tips 
than  she  did ;  and  once  I  had  a  serious  row  with  the 
manager  of  the  refreshment  bars.  Part  of  our 
duties  consisted  in  getting  refreshment  for  the 
various  performers,  and  any  friends  they  had  to 
visit  them.  A  charge  of  threepence  was  made  on 
each  glass  brought  behind  the  scenes ;  this  was  re- 
turned when  it  was  taken  back.  Some  of  the  hands 
casually  employed  got  into  the  way  of  taking  the 
glasses  from  the  bars  and  then  returning  them 
as  empties  from  the  theatre  and  claiming  the 
money.  As  this  money  was  placed  by  itself,  more 


180  GEORGE  MEEK 

glasses,  of  course,  were  returned  than  had  been 
paid  on,  and  we  dressers  were  accused  of  having 
taken  them.  I  had  a  scene  with  the  manager 
and  his  wife,  but,  upon  placing  the  facts  of  the 
case  before  Mr.  Standen  Triggs,  the  Managing 
Director  of  the  Park,  the  refreshment  manager, 
who  had  refused  to  serve  me  any  longer,  had  to 
apologize  and  withdraw  his  taboo  against  me. 

Finally,  the  female  dresser,  who  wanted  very 
badly  to  get  some  one  else  into  my  place,  got  me 
the  sack,  and  herself  at  the  same  time. 

It  was  n't  all  hard  work  and  trouble,  however. 
With  some  companies — the  D'Oyly  Carte  Opera 
(which  included  the  genial  Mr.  Workman,  who  is 
doing  so  well  at  the  Savoy)  especially — it  was  a 
pleasure  to  be  there.  With  Lewis  Waller's  com- 
pany in  Monsieur  Beaucaire  I  had  a  pleasant 
— and  lively — week.  I  have  mentioned  Sidney 
Brough  (in  The  Light  that  Failed};  I  also  dressed 
Mr.  Sainsbury  the  playwright  (Sherlock  Holmes) 
and  Louis  Calvert,  and  Mr.  Kendrick  in  the  pro- 
duction by  Fred  Terry  and  Julia  Neilson  of  Sun- 
day. Ivouis  was  very  ill,  very  irritable,  but  very 
generous. 

As  to  the  "supering, "  I  was  in  several  grand 
operas  with  a  Moody-Manners  Opera  Company. 
In  the  first  act  of  Lohengrin  I  had  to  stand  on  a 
rostrum  at  the  back  of  the  stage,  dressed  in  a 
thick  metalled  tunic,  holding  a  shield  and  spear, 
and  I  wasn't  supposed  to  move  for  fifty  minutes. 


181 

All  that  time  three  or  four  large  fleas  were  biting 
me  in  the  small  of  my  back.  They  were  not 
there  when  I  resumed  the  clothes  and  my  stand 
on  the  rostrum  for  the  fourth  act. 

My  last  visit  to  the  theatre  was  to  get  H.  B. 
Irving  and  Dorothea  Baird's  company  to  sign 
the  petition  for  the  release  of  Daisy  Lord  last 
autumn.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Irving  received  me  most 
kindly  in  their  dressing-room,  and  signed  my 
petition  readily — as  also  did  the  rest  of  their 
company. 

As  to  the  morals  devant  les  scenes — well,  they 
are  just  the  same  as  they  are  anywhere  else — 
some  and  some.  Some  of  the  poorer  musical 
comedy  companies  left  much  to  be  desired — 
probably  because  their  personnel  were  poorly 
paid. 


CHAPTER  XX 

OTHER  LOVES 

How  many  different  lives  have  I  lived  during 
the  past  twenty  years?  The  life  of  work,  the 
religious  life,  the  political,  the  erotic,  the  lives 
of  pleasure  and  study.  That  makes  half-a-dozen. 
And  I  have  lived  them  all  strenuously.  Not  to 
speak  of  my  home  life  in  which  most  of  them 
centred. 

My  relations  with  women  have  been  peculiar 
if  not  extensive.  I  am  fond  of  fair  women,  yet 
I  could  never  get  but  one  fair  woman  to  care 
for  me,  and  I  am  ashamed  to  say  I  would  not 
marry  her  because  she  had  a  child.  Like  my 
poor  grandmother  she  had  been  victimized  when 
very  young.  She  was  otherwise  a  virtuous  girl: 
a  plump,  intelligent,  happy-natured  girl,  fond  of 
fun  and  virtuous.  I  do  not  know  what  has  become 
of  her.  She  deserved  a  happy  life. 

My  first  effort  at  Socialist  organization  fell 
through  owing  to  most  of  the  members  of  our 
Fabian  Society  leaving  the  town.  I  returned 
to  the  chair  work.  I  had  quite  given  up  the 
chapel,  and  began  to  mix  with  very  questionable 

182 


OTHER  LOVES  183 

company.  I  had  met  with  so  many  disappoint- 
ments from  them  that  I  had  grown  tired  of 
treating  women  always  with  consideration  and 
respect.  I  made  up  my  mind  to  be  revenged  on 
the  sex  per  se. 

One  young  bathchair-man  whom  I  had  pre- 
viously abhorred  for  his  loose  life  I  now  made 
my  constant  companion.  I  wanted  to  see  "life." 
We  did  not  drink  much:  a  glass  or  two  of  ginger 
wine  or  ale  during  the  evening  was  the  extent 
of  our  excesses  in  that  direction.  But  we  scraped 
acquaintance  with  girls  on  the  parades  or  in  Ter- 
minus Road,  and  usually  we  had  half-a-dozen  or 
more  going  at  the  same  time.  If  we  found  them 
agreeable  we  kept  to  them  more  or  less,  if  not 
we  let  them  go.  But  whatever  "Weak  Chest" — 
the  nickname  of  my  companion — intended,  I  was 
all  the  time  secretly  looking  out  for  a  girl  whom  I 
thought  I  could  marry.  He  kept  most  of  the 
complaisant  ones  to  himself,  though  a  few  came 
my  way;  but  I  preferred  those  he  could  not 
seduce,  because  I  hoped  to  find  a  mate  amongst 
them. 

I  left  his  companionship  for  a  time  to  go  back 
to  Louie,  who  had  written  to  me,  having  dis- 
covered her  postman  lover's  perfidy.  I  spent 
the  summer  of  '94  courting  her.  I  used  to  get 
up  at  three  o'clock  on  the  Sundays  when  it  was 
her  morning  out  and  walk  the  sixteen  miles  to 
Hastings  so  as  to  miss  none  of  the  time  she  had 


184  GEORGE  MEEK 

at  liberty,  because  the  first  train  from  East- 
bourne did  not  reach  there  before  nearly  mid- 
day. We  had  some  good  times  together.  I 
could  earn  good  money  those  summers,  so  that 
I  could  afford  days  off.  Sometimes  when  it  was 
her  afternoon  out  I  earned  five  or  six  shillings 
before  dinner!  At  last  she  agreed  to  marry  me, 
and  the  banns  were  put  up  at  Eastbourne  and 
her  home  at  Tunbridge  Wells:  then  she  changed 
her  mind  at  the  last  minute.  She  returned  me 
my  ring — a  chased  gold  one  with  "Mizpah"  in 
highly  burnished  lettering  on  it  which  had  cost 
me  fifteen  shillings.  She  has  since  married  and 
had  children,  but  I  understand  she  has  always 
been  very  delicate,  so  perhaps  it  was  just  as  well 
I  did  lose  her. 

Her  treachery  upset  me  very  much,  and  partly 
through  that  and  partly  through  the  dread  of  the 
winter  I  became  very  depressed.  "Weak  Chest " 
had  always  been  in  the  habit  of  taking  drugs  of 
various  sorts.  Among  these  was  crude  opium, 
which  he  swallowed  in  small  pellets.  I  got  some 
— twopenny-worth,  I  think — and  swallowed  the 
lot,  washing  it  down  with  a  pint  of  Burton  ale  and 
hoping  I  should  never  wake  again.  Fortunately, 
or  unfortunately,  I  did,  but  I  was  confined  to  my 
bed  for  a  week  afterwards.  When  I  got  about 
again  I  resumed  my  nightly  prowls  with  "Weak 
Chest." 

I  had   two   or   three   more   disappointments. 


OTHER  LOVES  185 

One  was  a  little  fair  girl — a  laundry-maid  at  the 
Grand — with  whom  I  went  out  a  few  times, 
treating  her  to  the  theatre.  I  treated  her  with 
respect,  but  found  afterwards  that  she  deserved 
none.  Another,  a  tiny  dot  of  a  nurse  girl  from 
Cornwall  proved  to  be  "no  better  than  she 
should  be."  And  she  looked  so  innocent!  We 
met  with  all  sorts,  big  and  little,  chaste  and 
unchaste,  moral  and  very  much  immoral. 

"Weak  Chest"  had  a  companion  called  "Escol- 
lopes, "  a  dark,  half -balmy,  but  wholly  cunning 
yokel.  I  could  not  endure  this  man.  Even  as  it 
was  if  I  could  have  found  a  really  nice  girl  to 
care  for  me  I  should  have  broken  away  from  their 
company  a  long  while  before  I  did. 

Then  there  was  another  girl  who  pretended  to 
be  strictly  virtuous,  but  whom  we  discovered 
was  not;  a  fair  girl  with  thick  protruding  lips 
whom  I  might  have  married  if  my  wife  had 
served  me  the  same  as  Louie  had  done.  I  was 
keeping  company  with  both  of  them  at  the  same 
time.  I  did  n't  mean  to  be  sold  a  second  time. 
She  wrote  to  me  a  day  or  two  after  I  was  married 
and  my  wife  opened  the  letter. 

Then  there  were  two  sisters,  one  married,  one 
single:  the  married  one  was  not  a  prude,  the 
single  one  was. 

I  met  my  wife  through  the  introduction  of  a 
friend.  She  was  a  petite  dark  girl,  a  native  of 
Windsor.  I  was  tired  of  the  fast  life  I  was  leading. 


186  GEORGE  MEEK 

So  we  married.  I  have  never  been  sorry.  She  has 
been  a  good  and  faithful  wife.  I  have  been  a  bad, 
but  faithful  husband.  She  is  usually  cheerful  as  a 
cricket.  Considering  what  we  have  gone  through 
and  the  natural  shortcomings  of  her  husband  she 
keeps  her  happiness  remarkably  well.  She  is  fond 
of  singing,  and  used  to  be  fond  of  dancing.  A 
clever  girl,  she  was  formerly  a  leader  in  the  Band  of 
Hope  movement  in  her  native  town.  Her  father's 
mother  was  a  Bunyan,  a  direct  descendant  of  the 
author  of  the  Pilgrim's  Progress.  I  regard  her, 
as  I  have  every  reason  to,  with  the  deepest  affec- 
tion and  respect,  though  she  does  n't  always  think 
I  do.  I  shall  have  more  to  say  of  her  presently. 
We  were  married  on  November  23,  1895.  I  was 
then  twenty-seven. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

FIELD  LANE 

I  HAVE  made  several  journeys  to  London  in 
search  of  that  most  elusive  of  earthly  blessings 
for  the  worker — constant  employment.  One 
such  brought  me  into  contact  with  the  C.  O.  S. 
and  with  another  institution  where  the  treat- 
ment of  the  unfortunate  unemployed  contrasts 
very  favourably  with  what  is  accorded  them  by 
that  body. 

When  I  landed  in  town  I  had  the  better  part 
of  a  sovereign — if  not  more — in  my  pocket. 
My  first  care  was  to  provide  myself  with  lodg- 
ings for  at  least  a  week,  and  benefiting  by  earlier 
experiences  I  did  it  by  paying  for  them  in  ad- 
vance at  one  of  those  "Pearce  and  Plenty"  tem- 
perance hotels — very  useful  places  for  those  who 
can  afford  them.  I  did  n't  know  of  the  existence 
of  the  "Rowton  Houses"  till  later,  else  for  the 
same  money  I  could  have  procured  shelter  for  a 
fortnight. 

I  spent  this  week  in  going  from  place  to  place 
answering  advertisements — principally  from  the 

187 


188  GEORGE  MEEK 

Daily  Chronicle,  but  without  getting  a  berth.  I 
had  references  and  decent  clothes.  Then,  my 
time  being  up,  and  my  money  all  gone,  I  spent 
a  night  or  two  on  the  Albert  Embankment,  where 
I  met  an  unemployed  brass-fitter  who  advised 
me  to  apply  to  the  C.  O.  S.  and  the  Field  Lane 
Homes. 

This  I  did  the  next  day.  I  was  kept  waiting 
some  time  at  the  C.  O.  S.  office  near  Shaftesbury 
Avenue.  Then  I  was  interviewed  by  a  super- 
cilious young  man  and  woman,  who  advised 
me  to  return  to  Eastbourne.  However,  I  told 
them  how  bad  things  had  been  there,  and  they 
sent  me  with  a  note  to  a  certain  Refuge  in  the 
neighbourhood  of  Hoxton.  Here  the  manager, 
or  whatever  he  was,  refused  to  take  me  in,  but 
gave  me  a  ticket  for  a  penny  basin  of  soup. 

I  told  them  I  was  homeless,  but  that  is  all  they 
did  for  me.  At  the  same  time  they  wrote  to 
friends  of  mine  in  Eastbourne,  whose  names  I 
had  given  them  as  references,  for  subscriptions, 
pretending  that  they  had  "helped"  me! 

So  I  went  on  to  Field  Lane.  This  constitutes 
a  piece  of  old  London  situated  between  Rose- 
bery  Avenue  and  Saffron  Hill.  You  turn  down 
Vine  Street — out  of  the  Clerkenwell  Road — 
which  contains  the  Holborn  Workhouse,  and  you 
find  what  is  left  of  Field  Lane  at  the  bottom. 
Rosebery  Avenue,  which  you  may  reach  by  a 
flight  of  steps,  has  cut  the  rest  off.  In  a  corner 


FIELD  LANE  189 

formed  by  the  junction  of  Vine  Street  and  Field 
Lane  there  is  a  large  block  of  buildings  which 
contains  the  Working  Men  and  Women's  Refuges, 
a  creche,  a  large  hall  used  for  religious  meetings  and 
the  offices  of  the  Field  Lane  Mission — an  insti- 
tution founded  a  great  many  years  ago,  partly 
through  the  efforts  of  the  Baroness  Burdett-Coutts 
and  Charles  Dickens.  Connected  with  it  was  for- 
merly the  noted  "Field  Lane  Ragged  School, "  but 
that  has  ceased  to  exist. 

I  applied  here  for  shelter  and  was  admitted  at 
once.  To  be  taken  in,  if  there  are  any  vacancies, 
a  man  must  have  two  qualifications:  he  must  be 
decently  dressed  and  have  references,  and  he  is 
given  food  and  shelter  for  a  month  unless  he  ob- 
tains employment  before.  I  cannot  speak  too 
highly  of  this  institution  or  of  its  secretary,  Mr. 
Pratt  (I  think  that  was  his  name),  who  was  most 
kind  and  considerate  to  all  the  inmates.  Of 
course  one  did  not  get,  or  expect,  the  luxuries 
or  comforts  one  would  expect  at  a  hotel,  but 
there  were  good  warm  beds  and  plenty  of  food 
— some  consideration  to  one  who  had  been 
watching  for  daylight  on  the  embankments  for 
a  night  or  two,  with  an  empty  stomach  and  no 
prospect  of  breakfast. 

Having  been  admitted  and  enjoyed  a  good 
warm  bath,  I  was  given  a  large  cup  of  cocoa,  a 
plate  of  cold  meat  and  some  bread.  The  beds 
are  arranged  in  two  dormitories,  one  above  the 


190  GEORGE  MEEK 

other,  the  lower  one  being  used  in  the  daytime 
as  a  refectory,  the  beds  being  folded  back  neatly 
against  the  walls.  In  the  morning  all  the  in- 
mates assist  in  cleaning  and  dusting  various 
parts  of  the  building.  Then  there  is  breakfast, 
a  large  mug  of  cocoa  with  a  pound  of  bread, 
after  that  a  short  service  in  a  large  room  (con- 
ducted by  the  secretary),  and  the  men  are  allowed 
to  go  where  they  choose  in  search  of  employ- 
ment until  five  P.M.  There  is  a  good  dinner  at 
noon  for  those  who  care  to  return  for  it.  At  tea 
time  a  pint  of  good  tea  and  another  pound  of 
bread.  The  inmates  supplement  their  bread 
with  meat  saved  from  dinner — which  is  plentiful 
— or,  if  they  can  afford  it,  with  butter  or  mar- 
garine they  buy  themselves.  I  believe  I  am  right 
in  adding  that  when  there  is  any  left  the  cook 
distributes  cold  meat  at  breakfast  and  tea.  Ex- 
cept that  they  are  not  supposed  to  enter  a  pub- 
lic-house when  they  are  out,  or  to  use  bad  language 
on  the  premises,  the  inmates  are  not  interfered 
with.  They  are  allowed  to  smoke  in  the  yards, 
if  they  can  procure  the  means,  and  if  they  can 
see  their  way  to  earning  a  few  shillings,  or  have 
appointments  with  respect  to  employment  out 
of  their  hours  of  liberty,  they  are  allowed  to 
go  out,  being  "let  off"  their  duties  in  the 
institution. 

Sunday  is  the  busiest  day.     At  the  top  of  the 
building  and  covering  the  whole  of  it  is  a  very 


FIELD  LANE  191 

large  mission  hall.  Here  the  Sunday  services 
are  held.  To  them  in  the  morning  come  such  a 
crowd  of  tatterdemalion  men  and  women  as  one 
can  only  see  at  such  a  function  in  a  great  city; 
for  after  the  religious  service  another  follows, 
which  is  the  cause  of  these  poor  wretches'  attend- 
ance: each  is  given  a  pint  of  steaming  hot  cocoa 
and  a  pound  of  bread.  These  are  not  the  ordi- 
nary inmates,  but  the  wreckage  of  society  from 
anywhere,  everywhere,  hundreds  of  them  wolfing 
their  food  as  though  they  have  had  none  before 
for  days. 

The  ordinary  inmates  assist  to  distribute  this, 
and  afterwards  clean  the  whole  place  out,  floors, 
forms  and  everything,  ready  for  the  Sunday 
school  which  assembles  there  in  the  afternoon. 
After  dinner,  which  is  always  accompanied  on 
Sundays  by  a  large  slab  of  bread-pudding,  some 
are  allowed  out  and  others  told  off  to  assist  in 
the  Sunday  school  by  acting  as  doorkeepers  and 
distributors  of  hymn-books.  Sometimes  enter- 
tainments are  given  during  the  week  to  which 
they  are  admitted  and  where  some  very  good 
singing  is  provided. 

I  stayed  there  four  weeks,  but  could  get  no 
employment,  except  three  or  four  days  addressing 
envelopes  at  an  office  in  the  City  Road,  kept  by 
an  advertising  agent.  At  this  place  they  ad- 
vertised for  a  few  sandwich-men  and  men  to  dis- 
tribute circulars  at  eighteen-pence  per  day.  Before 


192  GEORGE  MEEK 

seven  o'clock  in  the  morning  the  street  in  front  of 
the  office  was  crowded  with  hundreds  of  men  wait- 
ing for  the  chance  of  a  job  even  at  that  price !  And 
people  say  the  unemployed  are  idle  because  they 
won't  work! 

There  was  every  convenience  at  Field  Lane 
for  us  to  keep  ourselves  and  our  clothing  clean. 
When  I  had  nowhere  to  go  after  a  job  I  spent 
a  good  deal  of  time  in  the  South  Kensington 
Museum  or  in  the  free  libraries  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood of  Holborn  Town  Hall.  On  my  way 
back  in  the  evening  I  often  saw  crowds  of 
"casuals,"  men  and  women,  huddled  round  the  en- 
trance to  the  Holborn  Workhouse — such  rags  and 
awful  misery! 

After  my  month  was  up  I  had  a  night  or  two 
in  the  Rowton  House,  King's  Cross  Road — the 
working  man's  palace.  Then  I  thought  I  would 
go  to  Brighton,  and  it  took  me  nearly  two  days 
to  walk  there.  I  slept  the  intervening  night  in 
a  cart  in  an  open  wayside  shed  not  far  from 
Horley.  The  next  day  I  returned  to  Eastbourne 
in  despair. 

I  do  not  know  if  the  Field  Lane  institution  is 
still  in  existence,  or,  if  it  is,  whether  or  not  it  is 
conducted  on  the  same  lines.  I  trust,  for  the 
sake  of  at  least  a  few  of  the  poor  devils  who 
find  themselves  workless  and  homeless  in  London, 
that  it  is.  When  I  was  there  it  sheltered  men 
of  all  sorts — clerks,  mechanics,  sailors,  trades- 


FIELD  LANE  198 

men,  all,  so  far  as  I  could  see,  deserving  cases  of 
men  who  only  wanted  a  lift  to  get  on  their  legs 
again.  But  even  in  those  days — this  must  have 
been  a  great  many  years  ago — the  question  of 
the  unemployed  was  an  acutely  pressing  one, 
though  they  had  not  become  so  articulate  as  they 
have  recently.  "Society  must  find  a  solution  to 
the  unemployed  problem,  or  the  unemployed 
may  bring  about  the  solution  of  society. " 

In  the  meantime  the  Field  Lane  Missions  have 
done  something,  which  is  more  than  some  more 
pretentious  agencies  have. 


CHAPTER  XXII 

GOING  TO  THE  DEVIL 

WHEN  I  started  in  life  I  was  well  stocked 
with  ethical  ideals  of  a  high  order.  I  have  been 
stripped  and  left  like  the  man  in  the  Message 
from  Mars,  a  "beggar  and  in  rags"  so  far  as  my 
own  righteousness  has  been  concerned.  The 
irony  of  fate  is  most  curious.  I  was  fond  of  fair 
women,  they  would  have  none  of  me.  Dark 
women  haunted  me.  When  I  was  young  I  dis- 
liked beer  and  despised  the  drunkard.  Some- 
times now  I  drink  a  great  deal  of  beer,  though 
as  I  grow  older  I  am  getting  to  dislike  it  again. 
Then  if  I  did  n't  think  every  woman  a  saint  till 
I  was  thirty,  I  did  till  I  was  twenty-four — this  in 
spite  of  my  early  environment,  where  loose  talk 
was  common.  Then  I  turned  and  despised  and 
abused  them.  However,  during  those  bohemian 
years  I  never  wilfully  led  an  innocent  girl  astray, 
and  if  I  had  got  any  one  of  them  into  trouble 
I  should  have  married  her.  I  have  always  longed 
to  be  able  to  earn  enough  to  be  able  to  pay  my 
way  honestly.  I  hardly  ever  have.  "Owe  no 

194 


GOING  TO  THE  DEVIL       195 

man  anything,  except  to  love  one  another"  is  an 
injunction  I  would  gladly  obey — if  I  could.  Yet 
my  nature  is  so  complex  that  "Take  no  thought 
for  the  morrow"  is  an  order  I  obey  readily.  In- 
deed, I  find  I  have  to.  If  I  plan  and  take  care 
everything  goes  wrong.  When  I  have  a  number 
of  orders  booked  it  is  bound  to  rain.  Once  I  had 
orders  to  the  amount  of  eight-and-six  for  the  fol- 
lowing day,  and  I  needed  the  money  badly.  It 
poured  in  torrents,  and  I  only  managed  to  get 
eighteen-pence  of  it.  If  I  make  up  my  mind  to 
do  a  thing  it  is  hardly  ever  done.  If  I  determine 
not  to  do  anything  it  usually  happens.  I  did  not 
mean  to  write  this  story,  or,  writing  it,  meant 
to  suppress  a  great  many  things.  But  fate,  in 
the  form  of  Mr.  H.  G.  Wells,  has  proved  too  much 
for  me. 

I  have  spoken  of  "Escollopes, "  who  at  the  time 
I  first  met  him  lived  with  a  loose  woman.  He, 
too,  was  always  about  with  other  women.  At 
last  his  paramour  left  him,  and  he  married  a 
young  girl  who,  like  himself,  was  half  balmy. 
It  was  discovered  that  he  had  a  wife  living,  and 
he  was  sentenced  to  nine  months'  hard  labour 
for  bigamy.  He  was  a  bathchair-man,  and  used 
to  send  the  poor  girl  he  had  married  out  on  the 
streets.  He  was  so  utterly  lost  to  all  sense  of 
decency  that  he  bragged  of  what  she  earned 
there. 

A  third  beauty   was  a  married  man  having 


196  GEORGE  MEEK 

several  children.  He  had  failed  in  business  as 
a  baker  near  London.  If  he  could  possibly  be 
worse  that  the  other  two,  he  was.  He  is  dead. 

About  this  time  an  old  man,  the  very  image 
of  Sir  John  Falstaff,  came  to  our  town.  He 
had  money,  and  bought  several  chairs,  which 
he  let  out.  After  I  was  married  and  had  given 
up  the  company  of  these  men,  "Weak  Chest" 
and  "Escollopes"  went  to  lodge  with  this  old 
man  and  drew  chairs  for  him.  This  was  after 
Escollopes'  release  from  prison.  They  had  the 
amazing  impudence  to  advertise  for  house- 
keepers in  the  West  Sussex  Gazette,  although 
they  had  only  one  room  between  them.  Several 
girls  replied.  At  last  one,  the  daughter  of  a 
warder  in  the  county  gaol  at  Lewes,  came  to  in- 
vestigate. Information  was  given  to  the  police, 
they  were  ordered  out  of  the  town,  and  their 
licences  were  cancelled.  They  have  spent  most 
of  their  time  since  tramping  in  the  summer 
and  "resting"  in  the  workhouse  during  the 
winter.  The  last  time  I  saw  "Weak  Chest"  he 
was  suffering  from  some  sort  of  mental  decay. 
He  cherished  the  most  absurd  hallucinations 
about  people  and  things — especially  horse-racing, 
to  which,  with  women,  he  always  gave  most  of  his 
attention. * 

1  Since  writing  the  above  I  hear  this  man  has  been  sent  to 
a  lunatic  asylum.  If  such  be  the  case,  he  makes  the  eighth 
Eastbourne  chair-man  who  has  lost  his  reason  in  my  time. 


GOING  TO  THE  DEVIL       197 

It  was  through  this  man  I  got  to  know  most 
of  the  girls  I  did  during  my  three  or  four  years 
or  so  of  "fast"  life.  We  seldom  associated  with 
the  mercenary  Venus.  I  always  despised  her 
and  always  shall,  because  I  believe  the  sentimental 
nonsense  talked  about  her  is  mere  nonsense. 
Few  women  are  really  driven  to  the  streets  by  eco- 
nomic reasons.  A  clean-natured  girl,  if  she  gives 
way  to  her  instincts,  will  not  sell  her  body  for 
money;  she  would  rather  "work  her  fingers  to  the 
bone,"  or,  if  she  can  get  no  work,  go  to  the  "house." 
Only  calculating  evil-minded  women  take  to  the 
streets.  There  may  be  exceptions,  of  course;  that 
is  the  rule.  I  knew  one  fairly  decent  woman  who 
was  driven  out  by  a  lazy,  brutal  husband.  But  a 
poor  girl  I  used  to  know,  a  dainty,  refined,  re- 
ligious girl,  did  the  wise  thing.  A  soldier  whom 
she  had  unfortunately  met  and  married  wanted  to 
send  her  out  on  the  streets  in  Dublin.  She  went 
either  to  the  police  or  a  clergyman,  and  her  fare 
was  paid  home.  She  died  shortly  afterwards  of 
consumption.  That,  when  a  woman  has  fallen 
and  her  shame  is  open  so  that  she  is  despised 
by  every  one,  she  should  retort  by  becoming 
heartless  and  utterly  evil  is  natural.  My  con- 
tention is  that  the  average  prostitute  sins  from 
deliberate  choice  and  as  a  thief  robs — for  gain. 
I  know  she  cannot  help  herself.  It  is  her  nature, 
but  her  nature  is  evil.  She  is  own  sister  to  the 
woman  who  makes  a  mercenary  marriage. 


198  GEORGE  MEEK 

Though  when  I  was  young  I  disliked  drink  of 
any  kind,  somewhere,  somehow,  I  acquired  a 
taste  for  it. 

When  I  first  began  as  a  bathchair-man  I 
used  to  patronize  a  coffee-stall  near  the  Wish 
Tower,  but  I  found  in  time  that  the  food  and 
drink  supplied  there  was  unsatisfactory  and  too 
expensive,  consisting  as  it  did  of  cheap  cakes 
and  pastry.  Whereas  it  cost  me  fourpence  or 
fivepence  for  a  mid-day  meal  there,  and  then  I 
was  not  satisfied,  I  could  go  to  the  Devonshire 
Park  bar  and  get  a  fairly  good  meal  of  stout 
and  bread-and-cheese  for  twopence-halfpenny. 
Unfortunately,  the  cheese  often  proved  thirst- 
provoking.  Some  years  ago  one  could  get  good 
tea  and  coffee  at  the  Park,  but  so  far  as  the 
outside  bars  are  concerned  their  sale  has  been 
discontinued. 

Before  I  was  married  I  drank  occasionally, 
but  not  systematically.  Afterwards  the  habit 
grew  on  me  till  I  got  so  low  that  I  was  fast  be- 
coming a  confirmed  inebriate.  I  would  do  almost 
anything  to  get  drink.  I  have  given  up  drinking 
spirits  and  spending  my  nights  at  the  public- 
house  ;  possibly  I  shall  some  day  give  up  drinking 
beer.  I  take  it  sometimes  as  a  brain-stimulant, 
at  others  to  get  rest.  When  I  was  young  a  great 
many  people,  including  Ruth  and  her  mother, 
used  to  try  to  persuade  me  to  take  stout  on 
account  of  my  health,  but  I  refused  to  take  it 


GOING  TO  THE  DEVIL       199 

regularly.     I  did  not  like  it,  and  only  one  glass 
would  make  me  feel  tired. 

It  has  made  me  do  and  say  a  great  many  foolish 
and  wicked  things.  It  has  lost  me  some  friends; 
it  has  made  a  great  deal  of  the  unhappiness  of 
my  home  life.  It  has  aggravated  my  poverty. 
Yet- 
One  stands  for  days  worrying  with  insufficient 
food,  then  a  shilling  or  two  comes  along.  And 
if  they  sold  good  food  and  tea  and  coffee  in 
public-houses,  as  well  as  thirst-producing  food 
and  beer,  one  could  eat  more  and  have  a  cup  of 
tea.  Then  some  of  the  houses  in  which  we 
have  lived  have  been  so  overrun  with  fleas  and 
other  pests  that  sleep  was  impossible  without  a 
deep  drink.  I  have  only  met  two  or  three  really 
decent  men  as  publicans.  I  do  not  wish  to  make 
myself  out  as  being  any  better  or  any  worse  than 
I  really  am.  But  honestly  I  often  wish  I  could 
become  a  teetotaller — not  out  of  any  prudish 
consideration,  but  because  I  am  sure  it  would 
be  better  for  me  and  mine.  Some  days  I  drink 
very  little.  I  have  no  desire  for  it.  Often  I 
have  started  the  day  with  the  fixed  determination 
not  to  have  any  drink  at  all,  but  something  or 
some  fool  has  come  along  and  upset  me,  and  I 
have  ended  by  drinking  a  great  deal.  Times 
of  public  excitement,  too,  are  dangerous  to  me. 
I  am  extremely  sensitive  to  telepathic  influences 
both  from  a  distance  and  from  my  immediate 


200  GEORGE  MEEK 

environment.  When  there  is  a  great  deal  of 
drinking  going  on,  such  as  at  holiday  times,  or 
as  when  the  South  African  War  was  on,  I  find 
myself  strongly  seized  by  the  craving.  Perhaps 
before  this  is  published  I  shall  have  broken 
away  from  the  habit  altogether,  though,  as  I 
say,  it  is  useless  for  me  to  determine  to  do  any- 
thing, because  it  is  seldom  or  never  done  if 
I  do. 

But  since  my  illness  last  autumn,  which  my 
doctor  told  me  was  partly  caused  by  the  impure 
beers  I  had  been  drinking,  I  find  I  cannot  stand 
so  much  as  I  used  to.  I  suppose,  in  view  of 
Mr.  Lloyd  George's  Budget,  the  brewers  are 
using  even  more  chemicals  than  usual. 

When  I  was  young  I  used  to  take  considerable 
pride  in  my  appearance.  I  earned  more  money 
and  could  get  better  clothes.  I  always  wore 
cuffs  as  well  as  a  collar  and  tie — in  the  evening 
and  on  Sundays,  kid  gloves. 

But  the  years  have  sweated  all  that  out  of  me. 
Not  only  is  it  difficult,  sometimes  well-nigh  im- 
possible, for  one  to  keep  oneself  in  decent  boots 
and  clothing  at  our  uncertain  work,  but  when  we 
do  get  a  few  decent  things  the  demands  of  land- 
lord or  chair-owner  make  their  consignment  to 
the  pawnshop  inevitable.  Many  a  time  we  have 
stripped  the  clothes  off  our  backs  and  put  away 
our  bed  for  rent. 

So  one  gets  low  and  shabby  and  disheartened. 


GOING  TO  THE  DEVIL       201 

In  a  snobbish  town  like  Eastbourne  dress  means 
so  much.  With  little  chance  of  a  healthy  night's 
sleep  owing  to  the  insect  pests,  little  decent  food, 
many  unoccupied  hours,  much  worry  and  often 
many  disappointments  during  the  day,  it  is  no 
wonder  one  is  driven  to  the  abuse  of  alcohol. 

Of  course,  it  is  foolish  and  degrading,  and, 
like  all  unhealthy  practices,  it  breeds  its  own 
punishment  :  nature  takes  care  of  that.  But 
these  unhealthy  and  unnatural  habits  are  bred 
in  us  because  we  live  in  an  unhealthy  and  un- 
natural society.  On  the  other  hand,  nearly  all 
the  great  fighting  nations  have  been  hard-drink- 
ing nations :  we  are  engaged  in  one  of  the  hardest, 
if  not  the  hardest,  compaigns  of  all  time,  and  this 
war  will  not  be  to  the  battalions  of  plaster  saints. 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

HOME  AND  MARRIED  LIFE 

I  DESCRIBED  Kate  as  a  "petite  dark  girl."  She 
was  a  winsome  little  girl,  bright,  affectionate  and 
vivacious.  Our  life  has  been  a  trying  one;  but 
she  is  just  a  girl  still,  though  she  has  borne  me 
two  children  and  is  nearly  forty. 

I  had  only  a  few  decent  lodgings  before  I  was 
married.  When  I  got  any  really  comfortable 
ones  I  usually  had  to  leave  them  for  some  reason 
or  other,  from  no  fault  of  mine.  It  has  been  the 
same  with  our  homes  since. 

The  last  lodgings  I  had  when  I  was  single 
were  the  most  comfortable.  They  were  clean 
and  central,  and  I  did  precisely  as  I  liked.  I 
had  a  small  bed-sitting  room  on  the  ground-floor, 
where  I  could  have  any  friend  I  chose  to  see  me. 
Here  we  lived  for  some  time  after  we  were  married. 
We  had  a  lot  of  young  friends  who  used  to  visit 
us.  Then  we  furnished  rooms  in  a  house  where 
Kate  worked  as  an  ironer,  and  her  mother  came 
to  live  with  us.  She  was  a  sharp,  active  old 
lady,  a  regular  attendant  at  a  mission-hall  on 

202 


Sundays.  She  soon  obtained  employment,  and 
between  us,  for  a  few  years,  we  managed  fairly 
well.  Then  my  boy  was  born  on  Queen  Victoria's 
birthday,  1898.  We  had  been  married  about  three 
years. 

The  description  of  the  baby  in  The  Blue  Lagoon 
reminded  me  forcibly  of  him.  He  was  very 
ugly — at  first.  The  doctor  had  some  trouble 
to  get  him  to  cry.  Then  when  he  was  held  up 
for  us  to  see  him  he  looked  round  from  side  to 
side  with  queer  curiosity.  After  a  week  or  two 
he  became  very  beautiful;  he  had  bright  golden 
hair  and  deep  blue  eyes.  But  he  was  weakly, 
and  he  had  to  have  artificial  food.  He  was  sub- 
ject to  convulsions.  I  sat  up  with  him  for  nearly 
a  fortnight  with  a  bath  of  hot  water  with,  I  be- 
lieve, mustard  and  vinegar  in  it,  to  put  him  in 
on  a  fit  appearing.  The  doctor  pulled  him  through 
for  a  time,  however.  Then  we  had  to  have 
another  medical  man,  because  our  own  left  the 
town,  and  the  child  grew  worse,  dying  in  his 
grandmother's  arms  on  September  I. 

My  daughter  was  born  on  February  2,  1901, 
during  a  snowstorm.  Her  mother  was  able  to 
nurse  her,  and  though  she  is  slight  she  is  thriving, 
a  very  sharp,  cheerful  child.  She  takes  after  her 
mother. 

I  have  nursed  my  wife  through  two  illnesses. 
The  last  was  the  worst.  She  came  home  one  day 
complaining  of  pains  in  her  side.  I  got  her  to 


204  GEORGE  MEEK 

bed  and  fetched  a  doctor.  He  said  she  was  suf- 
fering from  pneumonia.  For  the  next  fortnight 
I  watched  her  night  and  day.  She  gradually 
grew  thinner  and  thinner,  till  nothing  was  left 
of  her  but  skin  and  bones.  Then  she  was  taken 
to  the  hospital  for  her  lung  to  be  drained.  Here 
she  lay  a  month,  coming  out  convalescent, 
and  by  the  kindness  of  some  friends  was  sent 
to  a  convalescent  home  away  at  Folkestone, 
and  when  she  came  back  she  looked  ten  years 
younger. 

Milly,  my  little  girl,  was  just  over  three  months 
old  when  her  grandmother  met  with  an  accident 
from  the  effects  of  which  she  died.  She  had 
always  been  a  great  help  to  us,  and  we  missed 
her  sadly.  About  this  time  we  had  an  Aberdeen 
terrier,  the  one  the  Hon.  W.  B.  Hanbury  gave 
me.  He  was  very  fond  of  the  old  lady,  prin- 
cipally, I  suspect,  because  she  brought  him  food 
from  the  hotel  where  she  worked.  He  used  to 
go  up  the  road  to  meet  her  regularly  every  night 
at  7.30 — her  time  for  coming  home.  When  he 
met  her  he  would  dance  round  her,  yelping,  in 
his  funny  way,  with  delight,  so  that  we  always 
knew  when  she  was  coming.  After  the  accident 
he  asked  to  be  let  out  at  7.15  every  night  till 
we  moved  to  another  house.  Here  his  favourite 
resting-place  was  on  the  staircase,  where  an  old 
dress  of  hers  was  hanging.  It  was  the  one  she 
was  wearing  at  the  time  of  her  accident,  and  had 


HOME  AND  MARRIED  LIFE    205 

blood  stains  on  it  which  we  could  not,  or  did  not, 
remove. 

I  never  see  a  quaint  Aberdeen,  with  its  funny 
waddle  and  curious  black  face,  without  thinking 
of  poor  "Whiskey";  he  was  my  constant  com- 
panion for  many  years.  I  had  other  dogs.  There 
was  "Becky,"  a  retriever  puppy  I  was  very  fond 
of.  She  was  an  unreliable  little  rip  with  a  will 
of  her  own,  and  we  had  to  part.  Then  I  had 
a  half-breed  retriever  who  would  fetch  and  carry 
anything  pretty  well.  Whiskey  and  Becky  were 
both  afraid  of  the  water;  this  dog — I  called  him 
' '  Dooley  "and  his  brother ' '  Peter  Jackson ' ' — they 
both  came  to  a  bad  end — followed  me  into  the 
water  and  tried  to  drag  me  out  when  I  went  bath- 
ing. If  I  live  to  own  another  dog  I'll  try  to  get 
another  Aberdeen.  They  have  their  faults,  but 
they  are  at  least  faithful  and  affectionate.  They 
are  very  intelligent  and  sensitive.  All  good  dogs 
are  sensitive.  Whiskey  used  to  cry  at  a  cross 
word,  as  also  did  Horace  Stretton's  brown  spaniel. 
Dogs,  cats,  horses — every  teachable  animal  can 
be  understood  and  will  understand  if  we  have 
patience  and  kindliness  enough  with  them.  I  and 
Whiskey  were  more  like  comrades  who  quite 
understood  each  other  than  master  and  dog.  In- 
deed, there  was  no  question  of  mastery  after  the 
first  few  weeks  of  teaching,  it  was  purely  one  of 
friendship. 

I   am  extremely   fond   of   animals   and    most 


206  GEORGE  MEEK 

living  things — trees  and  flowers,  insects  (except 
fleas!),  birds  and  cats.  There  is  an  old  Tom  in 
our  street  with  whom  I  have  been  on  speaking 
terms  for  some  time.  I  used  to  quarrel  years 
ago  with  a  caged  thrush.  He  was  a  wicked  bird 
who  could  sing  and  peck.  We  tried  once  to  keep 
a  tame  linnet  ourselves,  but  a  neighbour's  child 
frightened  it  to  death,  and  we  have  never  tried 
another.  The  sparrows  who  frequent  the  corners 
where  we  stand  with  our  chairs  come  and  ask 
us  for  food  when  they  see  us  eating.  Now  and 
then  one  will  eat  out  of  our  hands. 

Kate  did  not  return  to  work,  except  for  an 
occasional  week,  for  three  years  after  Milly  was 
born.  It  was  a  hard  struggle  to  live  with  the 
chair.  Now  and  then  I  was  helped  by  a  week's 
work  at  the  theatre  or  I  do  not  know  how  we 
should  have  got  through  at  all.  Milly  grew 
a  bright,  refined  little  thing  under  her  mother's 
care.  Since  she  has  been  to  school,  however, 
she  has  become  somewhat  wild.  Naturally,  as 
the  only  child,  she  is  petted  at  home,  but  we 
have  found  great  difficulty  in  getting  her  cared 
for  while  we  were  at  work,  as  she  should  be.  One 
woman  was  cruel  to  her  and  half-starved  her. 
That  led  to  the  whooping-cough,  from  which 
she  was  saved  by  a  good  doctor  and  emulsion  of 
cod  liver  oil.  Kate  had  just  returned  to  work. 
We  moved  to  a  house  where  the  landlady  took 
care  of  her.  We  paid  our  rent  regularly,  and 


HOME  AND  MARRIED  LIFE    207 

for  her,  and  left  food  for  her.  I  doubt  if  she  had 
much  of  the  food;  the  woman's  husband  was 
almost  always  out  of  work.  He  was  a  great 
drunken  lout  who  was  always  beating  his  wife: 
one  of  the  men  who  "don't  care."  Although 
he  did  me  all  the  harm  he  possibly  could,  I  saved 
him  from  being  "sold  up"  afterwards  by  telling 
a  broker's  man  that  he  hadn't  anything  worth 
taking — which  was  n't  the  truth.  The  high  rents 
for  small  houses  in  Eastbourne  make  it  impos- 
sible for  one  to  have  a  home  to  oneself.  Either 
you  must  let  rooms  or  take  rooms,  and  you  have 
to  chance  your  luck  as  to  what  kind  of  people 
you  get  with.  A  few  of  the  people  we  have 
lodged  with  have  been  passable,  but  we  have 
never  had  the  luck  to  catch  a  decent  lodger  when 
we  have  had  a  house  ourselves. 

One  winter,  when  Milly  was  very  young,  we 
had  a  large  room  at  three  shillings  per  week  with 
some  decent,  quiet  people.  They  had  a  daughter 
at  home,  a  pretty  little  brown-haired  girl  of 
eighteen  or  so,  who  used  to  be  good  company. 
She  liked  to  have  all  the  doors  open  when  her 
parents  were  out,  so  that  she  could  hear  my  some- 
times equivocal  jokes.  She  was  a  good  girl,  just 
taking  a  furtive  peep  at  the  joy  of  life.  In  the 
spring,  to  my  great  regret,  we  had  to  leave  to 
enable  her  parents  to  let  the  room  furnished. 
We  had  to  take  an  old  cottage  in  the  very  worst 
slum  in  Eastbourne,  because  in  the  spring  un- 


208  GEORGE  MEEK 

furnished  rooms  are  hard  to  come  by.  Here  we 
found  the  environment  absolutely  too  degraded, 
and  we  took  two  unfurnished  rooms  with  the 
people  I  have  mentioned  above. 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

THE    LOWEST    DEPTH 

OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES  says  somewhere 
that  every  man  has  three  personalities,  two 
more  or  less  fictitious  and  one  real:  what  he 
appears  to  others,  what  he  thinks  of  himself, 
and  what  he  really  is.  Furneaux  Jordan,  in  his 
valuable  treatise  on  Physiology  and  Character, 
divides  the  human  temperament  broadly  into 
two  classes — the  critical  and  the  emotional — 
which  are  linked  by  any  number  of  gradations. 
Whatever  truth  there  may  be  in  either  of  these 
postulates,  I  personally  consider  that  most  char- 
acters are  many-sided,  and  that  they  possess 
some  aspects  which  are  developed  only  under 
exceptional  circumstances.  Men  change  con- 
siderably with  changing  conditions.  Not  all, 
but  most,  appear  to  be  all  right  till  they  get  into 
the  fire  of  temptation  or  adversity.  Then  their 
equanimity  or  their  probity  shrivels  up  like 
burnt  straw.  The  Mark  Tapleys  are  few  in  real 
life,  though  now  and  then  one  meets  a  specimen. 
The  censorious  whr  would  n't  do  this,  that  or  the 
14  209 


210  GEORGE  MEEK 

other,  and  who  brag  that  they  have  weathered 
temptation  are  many;  but  when  one  gets  to 
know  the  truth  about  them  one  finds  that  there 
has  been  some  counterbalancing  circumstance  or 
other  which  has  prevented  them  from  falling. 

I  knew  a  man  who  had  been  in  constant  em- 
ployment practically  all  his  working  life.  He 
helped  others  less  fortunate  than  himself  on 
occasion,  though,  like  all  such  people,  he  imagined 
that  if  others  were  not  so  fortunate  as  he  was  it 
was  their  own  fault.  He  was  himself  unexpectedly 
thrown  out  of  work,  and  remained  out  for  some 
time.  Having  a  large  family  it  soon  became  a 
really  distressing  case.  I  called  the  attention  of  a 
wealthy  gentlemen  I  knew — the  late  Mr.  Melia,  a 
retired  tea  merchant — to  it,  and  he  promptly 
helped  with  a  sovereign.  This  got  to  the  ears  of 
another  man  I  knew,  who  had  been  out  of  work  but 
was  in  employment  again.  He  was  quite  contemp- 
tuous. "I  don't  believe  in  charity,"  he  said,  and 
I  found  out  afterwards  that  his  wife  not  only 
had  a  considerable  sum  of  money  by  her,  but 
that  she  worked  and  kept  him  when  he  was  doing 
nothing. 

It  is  certainly  a  great  mistake,  as  a  rule,  to 
take  people  upon  their  own  estimate — even  when 
they  are  not  wilfully  lying. 

These  remarks  have  been  induced  by  a  retro- 
spective mood  which  I  have  been  in  this  morn- 
ing: a  mood  which  is  quite  naturally  induced 


THE  LOWEST  DEPTH         211 

by  this  work,  and  I  have  been  trying  to  weigh 
my  own  character,  a  very  difficult  job,  because 
it  appears  of  a  mercurial  nature,  and  my  scales 
are  defective.  That  I  might  have  been  different 
and  acted  differently  I  have  no  doubt — had  I 
possessed  different  qualities.  It  is  easy  to  be 
wise  after  the  event.  I  am,  unfortunately  for 
one  thing,  of  the  same  stock  as  poor  "Tess's" 
family,  the  "Come  day,  go  day,  God  send  Sun- 
day" people.  Very  foolish  of  me,  I  know,  and 
very  unfortunate  for  me;  if  I  could  reshape  my 
disposition  so  as  to  ally  myself  with  some  more 
prudent  and  more  fortunate  tribe  I  should  be 
thankful. 

And  sometimes  God  sends  a  very  bad  Sunday. 

One  year — it  was  when  Milly  was  about  three 
years  old — I  had  had  a  very  bad  spring.  Two 
or  three  chairs  had  been  taken  away  from  me 
because  I  could  not  pay  the  rent  regularly:  one 
I  had  hired  through  the  worst  of  the  winter 
and  was  only  five  shillings  in  arrears.  Then  a 
man  named  Smith,  who  has  the  best  chairs  in 
the  town,  but  who,  being  a  Conservative,  is 
down  on  me  as  an  "agitator,"  let  me  have  one 
of  his.  After  a  wet  week  doing  nothing,  quite 
by  chance  I  picked  up  a  good  job  for  a  fort- 
night. This  enabled  me  to  get  some  much  needed 
clothing  and  medicine  and  nourishment  for 
Milly,  who  was  recovering  from  whooping- 
cough. 


212  GEORGE  MEEK 

At  that  time  we  were  lodging  with  the  drunken 
lout  I  have  mentioned  in  another  place.  We 
had  paid  our  rent  regularly  and  helped  them  all 
we  could,  as  he  was  out  of  work  most  of  the 
time;  but  in  a  drunken  fit  he  had  given  us  notice, 
and  we  had  taken  other  lodgings.  The  party 
I  had  been  taking  out  had  gone  away,  and  it 
being  at  the  end  of  June — a  very  dull  time — I 
did  the  moving  myself,  as  I  had  no  work  to  go  to. 

On  the  Monday  I  had  a  feeling  of  horrible 
depression.  I  am  subject  to  these  fits,  and  they 
invariably  portend  some  evil.  On  the  Tuesday 
I  did  the  moving,  and  was  horrified  to  find  all 
our  bedding  infested  with  house  bugs,  so  I  had 
to  take  it  to  the  destructor,  and  we  slept  that 
night  on  the  floor.  The  next  morning  I  took 
Milly  to  a  friend  of  ours  in  Leslie  Street,  as  the 
landlady  at  the  new  address  refused  to  look  after 
her  on  account  of  her  cough.  It  was  unusual 
for  me  to  take  her  out  so  early  in  the  morning. 
She  was  delighted,  and  danced  along  by  my  side 
singing  the  chorus  of  "The  Holy  City,"  which 
she  had  learned  through  hearing  me  sing  that 
song.  We  met  the  friend  I  was  taking  her  to 
— an  old  workmate  of  my  wife's — and  she  took 
charge  of  her.  I  went  out  with  my  chair,  but 
got  nothing.  Just  before  twelve  o'clock  another 
chair-man  told  me  that  a  county  court  bailiff  had 
been  looking  for  me  for  a  day  or  two  with  a  warrant 
for  my  arrest. 


THE  LOWEST  DEPTH         213 

I  knew  there  was  a  judgment  against  me  on 
the  suit  of  a  firm  of  "tallymen."  This  firm  has 
branches  all  over  the  country,  and  is  reputed  to 
have  more  cases  in  the  various  county  courts 
than  any  other  establishment.  Their  one  pre- 
occupation in  politics  is  the  fear  lest  imprison- 
ment for  "contempt  of  court"  (as  it  is  called) 
should  be  by  law  abolished. 

Knowing  I  was  two  months  in  arrears  in  my 
payments  into  court,  I  put  my  chair  away  and 
went  towards  home  with  the  intention  of  selling 
some  furniture ;  but  on  the  way  I  met  the  bailiff, 
who  arrested  me.  I  told  him  what  I  intended 
doing,  but  he  said  the  warrant  had  been  issued 
not  only  for  the  two  instalments  overdue,  but  for 
the  full  amount  of  the  debt. 

The  laws  relating  to  debtor  and  creditor  in 
England  form  one  of  the  most  glaring  instances 
of  class  legislation.  Those  who  are  compara- 
tively well-to-do  or  who  can  command  large  sums 
and  large  credits  may  contract  any  amount  of 
debt,  which  if  they  have  enough  ready  money 
to  pay  the  preliminary  fees  involved  in  becom- 
ing bankrupt  they  can  shuffle  off  without  any 
great  personal  inconvenience.  I  have  met  num- 
bers of  men  who  have  "broke,"  some  of  them 
for  thousands.  They  did  n't  seem  much  the 
worse  for  it,  many  of  them,  and  in  many  in- 
stances started  in  business  again  and  became 
as  big  as  ever.  To  say  nothing  of  the  notorious 


214  GEORGE  MEEK 

bankrupts  of  the  Hooley  and  "Jubilee  Plunger" 
classes.  But  if  a  poor  man  gets  into  debt  he 
must  pay  or  go  to  prison. 

Again.  If  a  man  owes  less  than  fifty  pounds 
he  cannot  become  bankrupt.  He  may  obtain 
an  administration  order,  under  which  he  will 
have  to  pay  twenty-five  per  cent,  or  fifty  per  cent. 
or  the  whole  of  what  he  owes  by  monthly  instal- 
ments; if  he  fails  to  do  so  he  is  liable  to  be  im- 
prisoned for  twenty-eight  or  forty  days.  If  he 
owes  more  than  fifty  pounds  and  can  raise  enough 
money  to  pay  the  necessary  fees  he  can  become 
a  bankrupt,  perhaps  pay  nothing,  and,  unless 
he  is  fraudulent,  is  not  sent  to  gaol — 

"One  law  for  the  rich,  another  for  the  poor — 
O,  what  a  happy  land  is  England!" 

The  bailiff  took  me  to  the  Gildredge,  where  he 
treated  me  to  a  drink  or  two.  He  paid  for  drinks 
for  me  there  and  more  at  Lewes.  I  was  very 
glad  of  them.  Besides  having  a  thirst  induced 
by  eating  salt  fish  for  breakfast,  my  position 
made  alcohol  acceptable.  These  he  paid  for  out 
of  my  "conduct  money."  Had  I  chosen  I  could 
have  demanded  a  cab  at  Lewes  station.  I  pre- 
ferred the  beer.  He  also  gave  me  a  letter-card, 
which  I  posted  to  my  wife  telling  her  what  had 
happened  and  where  Milly  was.  This  did  not 
reach  her  until  the  following  day,  and  she  passed 
a  terrible  night  of  anxiety. 


THE  LOWEST  DEPTH         215 

Arrived  at  Lewes  we  went  up  that  via  dolorosa 
School  Hill,  calling  at  a  fried  fish  shop  and  the 
White  Hart  for  refreshments.  Arrived  at  the 
prison — which  I  had  passed  many  times  before, 
devoutly  hoping  I  might  never  see  the  inside  of 
it — I  was  handed  over  to  the  receiving  warder. 

A  shiver  ran  through  me  as  the  outer  gate 
was  shut  and  locked  behind  me.  The  bailiff 
conducted  me  across  a  paved  court  up  some 
steps  to  a  large  glazed  door.  This  was  unlocked 
by  a  warder  standing  inside,  who  relocked  it 
after  our  admission.  We  entered  a  large  corridor 
with  doors  opening  on  either  side  of  it,  through 
one  of  which  we  passed  into  the  receiving  office, 
where  I  was  handed  over  to  the  prison  authorities 
as  represented  by  another  warder.  There  were 
about  half-a-dozen  wretched-looking  men  sitting 
in  this  place  on  forms  against  the  walls.  I  gath- 
ered that  they  had  all  been  committed  from 
Brighton  for  petty  offences.  One  of  them  was 
a  very  old  man  of  the  tramp  variety,  who  had  a 
large  flag  basket  on  a  string. 

We  were  told  to  take  off  our  boots,  and  were 
weighed  and  measured.  Then  we  were  taken 
through  corridors  and  down  various  flights  of 
stairs  to  another  warder,  who  was  seated  at  a 
table  in  a  dark  passage.  One  by  one  we  had 
to  pass  into  the  bath-room,  where  we  had  to 
strip  and,  I  think,  put  our  clothes  outside.  I 
was  not  allowed  to  keep  my  own  clothes,  which 


216  GEORGE  MEEK 

was  rather  annoying,  as  I  had  carefully  con- 
cealed most  of  the  tobacco  I  had  about  them, 
all  except  a  small  piece,  which  I  put  in  my  mouth. 
I  don't  know  whether  water  was  scarce  at 
Lewes  that  year,  or  whether  they  were  afraid 
we  should  commit  suicide  by  drowning  ourselves 
in  it  if  they  gave  us  enough;  but  I  had  only 
about  six  inches  of  it,  and  that  very  dirty,  in 
which  to  bathe.  When  I  got  outside,  the  warder, 
who  was  urbane,  not  to  say  genial,  told  me  to 
spit  the  tobacco  out  of  my  mouth.  I  was  then 
shut  into  a  large  tile-paved  cell  opposite  the 
bath-room,  where  after  a  time  a  bundle  was 
thrown  in  to  me.  This  contained  a  blue  jacket 
and  a  pair  of  trousers,  an  old  "glengarry"  cap, 
a  coarse  shirt,  two  low  shoes  (odd  ones),  with 
broken  pieces  of  lace  in  them,  a  wooden  spoon 
and  a  towel — all  marked  with  a  broad  arrow. 
After  a  time  they  brought  my  supper,  skilly  and 
coarse  brown  bread.  After  a  restless  night,  feel- 
ing horribly  miserable,  then  breakfast,  the  same 
as  supper.  After  that  the  doctor — a  genial 
official  who  joked.  "Anything  the  matter  with 
you?"  he  asked.  "No,"  I  said.  "What's  the 
matter  with  your  eyes?"  he  asked.  "They've 
always  been  like  that,"  I  replied.  Doctors 
always  want  to  look  at  my  eyes,  and  I  know 
it's  no  use.  "Anything  else?"  he  asked.  "Only 
being  in  here,"  I  said.  "Oh!"  he  answered, 
"you  '11  soon  get  over  that." 


THE  LOWEST  DEPTH        217 

Then  I  was  taken  up  to  the  governor's  office. 
This  is  situated  in  the  central  block  of  the  prison. 
Outside  it  corridors  lit  by  skylights  and  occa- 
sional windows  at  the  side,  with  long  rows  of 
doors  in  between,  seemed  to  branch  off  in  every 
direction,  intersected  and  crossed  and  recrossed 
by  iron  stairways,  bridges  and  balconies.  Stone 
and  iron  or  steel  in  every  direction.  I  had  to 
cross  complicated  bridges  and  ascend  and  de- 
scend various  stairways.  I  was  left  at  a  door 
opening  on  the  central  hall,  where  the  governor's 
office  is  situated,  by  the  warder  who  had  con- 
ducted me  there.  Being  a  stranger  to  the  place 
and  after  the  dark  cell  and  passages  dazzled  with 
the  light,  I  did  not  know  which  way  to  go.  A 
group  of  warders  stood  on  the  floor  below. 
"Come  on!  this  way!"  one  of  them  shouted  in 
a  brutal  voice.  Of  course  I  took  the  wrong 
turning.  "Now  then,  where  are  you  going  to?" 
he  shouted  again.  "We'll  soon  make  you  look 
lively  now  we  Ve  got  you  here. " 

I  got  to  the  floor  at  last,  and  was  ordered  to 
put  my  bundle  (containing  towel,  etc.)  on  the 
floor  and  stand  with  my  face  to  the  wall.  There 
were  others,  and  we  had  to  stand  about  two  feet 
apart  from  each  other.  After  waiting  what 
seemed  to  me  to  be  an  inordinately  long  time 
I  was  taken  before  the  governor,  a  little  short  man 
in  a  cycling  suit,  who  sat  behind  a  large  writing- 
table.  He  read  the  committal  order  to  me. 


218  GEORGE  MEEK 

Then  the  chief  warder,  a  big  pompous  man, 
questioned  me  as  to  my  name  and  so  on.  When 
he  came  to  "What  religion?"  I  replied,  "Ag- 
nostic, "  as  I  had  the  night  before  to  the  warder 
in  the  dark  passage  down  below. 

"  What  ?  "  puffed  the  chief  warder. 

"Agnostic, "  I  replied. 

"  'E  dunno  what  'e  means, , sir, "  he  remarked 
to  the  governor.  I  don't  know  what  the  latter 
entered  in  the  prison  register  as  my  religion. 
After  my  examination  by  the  governor  some  one 
behind  me  asked  me  if  I  could  read.  I  found 
afterwards  that  he  was  the  librarian. 

To  my  disgust  I  was  placed  in  charge  of  the 
brute  who  shouted  at  me  when  I  could  not  see 
my  way.  Nearly  all  the  warders  were  pigs, 
but  this  was  the  worst  of  the  lot.  We  were  all 
glad  when  at  the  end  of  the  week  he  went  on 
night  duty,  and  we  had  a  little  better  kind  of  a 
swine  during  the  day. 

He  conducted  me  down  one  of  the  corridors 
and  across  a  yard  to  one  of  the  outer  wings  of 
the  prison,  which  has  from  time  immemorial 
been  devoted  to  debtors  and  people  committed 
for  non-payment  in  civil  cases — such  as  passive 
registers.  I  was  given  a  yellow  badge  marked 


I,  12  being  the  number  of  my  cell  in  the 
D  section — which  I  had  to  fasten  on  a  button 


THE  LOWEST  DEPTH         219 

on  my  jacket.  I  was  locked  into  a  smaller, 
narrower  cell  paved  like  the  other  with  tiles. 
This  contained,  to  the  left  of  the  grated  and 
frosted  window,  a  wooden  plank  bed,  to  the 
right  a  cocoa-nut  fibre  mattress  and  pillow  with 
blankets,  sheets  and  counterpane  standing  under 
a  small  shelf  upon  which  were  devotional  books 
and  a  slate  and  pencil.  Between  these  and  the 
door  were  various  tin  utensils,  which  had  to  be 
placed  in  a  certain  precise  order  against  the 
wall:  a  small  wooden  stool  and,  just  inside  the 
door,  a  small  table  over  which  was  a  small  gas 
bracket  and  a  bell-pull,  neither  of  which  I  had 
occasion  to  use. 

After  dinner  I  was  given  cocoa-nut  fibre  to 
pick.  This  was  my  usual  occupation,  and  in 
spite  of  the  warder's  sneers  and  threats  I  picked 
as  little  as  possible.  I  argued  that  I  had  been 
sent  to  this  institution,  which  was  maintained 
mainly  in  the  interests  of  the  exploiting  class,  by 
one  of  its  members,  and  I  would  see  them  farther 
before  I  would  do  more  than  I  was  obliged  to. 

On  week  days  we  had  to  be  up  at  six,  empty 
our  slops,  brush  out  our  cells,  burnish  our  tin- 
ware with  soap  and  brick-dust  till  they  looked 
like  silver,  roll  up  our  bedding — the  sheets, 
blankets,  etc.,  had  to  be  folded  just  so  in  one 
precise  way.  At  seven  we  had  breakfast — a  pint 
of  tea  and  a  lump  of  brown  bread, — then  exercise 
in  one  of  the  yards.  Here  we  were  allowed  to 


220  GEORGE  MEEK 

converse.  I  found  another  man  from  Eastbourne 
there  under  an  administration  order,  a  grandson 
of  the  old  John  Vine  I  used  to  meet  at  the  Liberal 
Club.  A  laundryman  was  there  for  non-pay- 
ment under  an  affiliation  order  from  Hastings,  and 
several  from  the  same  place  for  rate  default. 
There  was  also  a  well-dressed  man  from 
Brighton,  whose  friends  "bought  him  out"  be- 
fore the  expiration  of  his  term;  he  was  the  only 
one  of  us  who  had  retained  his  private  clothes. 
We  exercised  twice  a  day,  a  welcome  break  to 
the  monotony  of  solitary  confinement.  The 
yards  in  which  we  walked  and  chatted  contained 
flower  borders  full  of  roses  in  bloom. 

After  exercise  came  chapel.  We  sat  in  two 
rows  quite  at  the  back,  with  one  or  two  "second 
division"  prisoners  near  us.  They  were  dressed 
in  chocolate-coloured  uniforms,  the  ordinary 
prisoners  in  khaki.  There  were  some  who  wore 
knickers  instead  of  trousers,  whom  I  understood 
to  be  long  term  convicts.  I  saw  one  white- 
headed  man,  who  reminded  me  of  "Navvy,"  the 
old  chair-man,  and  I  pitied  him  very  much.  The 
ordinary  prisoners  filed  into  chapel  in  batches 
from  different  doors  to  ours,  and  I  could  not  help 
remarking  how  ghastly  white  many  of  their  faces 
were.  I  did  not  see  any  women;  there  was  a 
gallery  over  our  heads  where  I  supposed  them 
to  be.  Along  each  wall,  at  the  end  of  each  third 
or  fourth  row,  was  a  kind  of  rostrum  in  which 


THE  LOWEST  DEPTH         221 

the  warders  sat  so  that  they  could  overlook  the 
prisoners. 

I  had  not  attended  church  or  chapel  for  a  good 
many  years,  and  I  looked  upon  these  services 
with  contempt,  considering  them  a  bitter  mock- 
ery both  of  the  alleged  God  in  whose  honour 
they  were  supposed  to  be  held  and  the  people 
who  were  compelled  to  attend  them.  In  my 
mind  I  jeered  at  and  despised  the  class  which 
had  instituted  them  and  the  creature  they  paid 
to  conduct  them.  He  came  in  and  went  out 
locking  and  unlocking  the  door  after  him  like 
any  other  warder;  for  I  considered  him  as  being 
nothing  but  a  superior  sort  of  warder  who  paraded 
in  a  white  surplice  instead  of  a  blue  uniform. 

After  chapel  we  were  marched  back  to  our 
section  and  locked  into  our  cells  till  dinner  time, 
the  morning  being  broken  by  the  governor's  in- 
spection. This  function  also  aroused  my  secret 
derision.  A  warder  came  first,  unlocking  and 
opening  the  cell  doors.  Then  the  governor 
marched  by,  a  little  man  in  a  dark-grey  knicker- 
bocker  suit,  between  the  pompous  chief  and 
another  warder,  all  three  employing  the  goose 
step  and  presenting  a  spectacle  that  would  bring 
the  house  down  if  it  were  repeated  on  the  stage. 
While  they  passed  we  had  to  stand  at  attention 
at  the  back  of  our  cells. 

Then  came  dinner — at  twelve.  There  was 
always  the  brown  bread  and  half  washed  potatoes 


222  GEORGE  MEEK 

in  their  skins.  The  other  constituents  were 
varied,  consisting  either  of  suet  pudding,  a  piece 
of  boiled  meat,  "bully  beef,"  or  a  very  small 
piece  of  bacon — all  fat — with  haricot  beans.  In 
the  afternoon  exercise  again,  and  work  till  tea 
time,  when  we  had  a  pint  of  cocoa  and  more 
brown  bread.  A  warder  visited  us  at  about 
seven,  and  told  us  to  put  our  work  outside,  after 
which  we  were  free  to  go  to  bed. 

Twice  a  week  the  librarian,  accompanied  by 
a  prisoner,  changed  our  books.  Prisoners,  ac- 
companied by  a  warder,  brought  us  our  meals. 
Most  of  them  had  grown  semi-circular  beards. 
I  was  beginning  to  show  signs  of  one  myself 
when  I  was  released.  These  men  would  say  a 
word  or  two:  "Cheer  up!"  "It  won't  be  long!" 
or  some  similar  phrase,  if  they  could  do  so  with- 
out attracting  attention. 

On  Sundays  we  had  longer  services,  more 
exercise  and  no  work.  The  Catholics  and 
Protestants  held  separate  services  in  the  same 
chapel.  Sometimes  at  the  former  we  could  hear 
some  very  fine  singing. 

Some  of  the  other  debtors  had  work  to  do  for 
which  they  were  paid, — white- washing,  mail- 
bag  making  and  so  on,  and  once  or  twice  we 
were  marched  up  to  clean  and  dust  the  chapel. 
This  made  a  change,  and  the  warder  in  charge 
of  us  there  chatted  affably,  told  us  stories  and 
did  not  drive  us. 


THE  LOWEST  DEPTH        223 

I  found  the  confinement,  the  monotony  and 
the  want  of  tobacco  the  hardest  to  bear.  At 
first  I  counted  the  days,  then  the  hours,  to  the 
date  of  my  release.  I  was  allowed  to  write  one 
letter,  which  I  sent  to  a  friend  of  mine  in  East- 
bourne, asking  him  to  see  if  he  could  raise  a 
collection  amongst  the  chair-men  and  others  to 
help  my  wife  during  my  imprisonment,  giving 
him  a  message  to  Smith  the  chair-owner. 

I  received  his  reply  the  morning  of  my  release. 
He  told  me  he  had  collected  only  one  shilling, 
and  that  the  chair-owner  said  I  could  n't  have 
the  chair  again.  Directly  a  man  becomes  an 
exploiter,  even  if  it  is  in  only  a  little  tin-pot  way, 
he  ranges  himself  on  the  side  of  the  predatory 
class. 

It  was  good  to  get  out  into  the  fresh  morning 
air — and  to  have  a  smoke.  There  were  several 
prisoners  released  at  the  same  time.  One  of 
them,  who  had  done  a  month  as  a  "drunk  and 
disorderly,"  wanted  a  clay  pipe  and  some 
matches.  I  had  no  light,  so  he  took  me  into  a 
public-house,  where  he  treated  me  to  some  beer 
and  tobacco.  Good  luck  to  him!  I  had  n't  a 
penny.  If  ever  I  go  again — and  one  never  knows 
one's  luck — I  shall  insist  on  having  either  the 
cab  or  some  of  the  "conduct  money"  to  spend 
when  I  come  out.  The  agent  of  the  Discharged 
Prisoners  Aid  Society  met  us  at  the  station,  but 
he  would  pay  my  fare  only  as  far  as  Polegate. 


224  GEORGE  MEEK 

When  I  got  out  at  Polegate  I  had  about  four 
miles  to  walk  into  Eastbourne — wondering  what 
was  going  to  happen  next.  I  remember  think- 
ing that  everything  was  "on  the  knees  of  the 
gods." 

I  found  that  the  man  at  the  house  where  we 
had  taken  rooms  had  threatened  to  turn  my  wife 
out  when  she  came  home  from  work  the  day  I 
was  put  away.  He  had  no  excuse  and  no  legal 
right  for  doing  so,  but  she  got  a  friend  to  let 
her  have  a  furnished  room.  She  found  out  where 
Milly  was  after  some  trouble.  When  I  reached 
the  house  where  she  was  staying — it  was  on  a 
Tuesday  and  she  had  not  gone  to  work — Milly 
came  running  to  me,  crying  out,  "Oh,  daddy!  my 
daddy!"  the  tears  running  down  her  face.  We 
have  always  been  great  friends,  I  and  Milly, 
though  we  fall  out  sometimes,  as  most  friends  do. 
Kate  had  sold  most  of  the  furniture  while  I  was 
away.  The  people  who  took  her  in  made  her  pay 
pretty  dearly  for  her  accommodation. 

We  lodged  with  them  for  some  time.  The 
house  was  horribly  verminous.  The  people 
earned  good  money,  but  never  had  anything  for 
their  use.  They  had  "commandeered"  all  our 
odds  and  ends  of  jugs  and  basins,  saucepans 
and  crockery,  and  everything  else  they  could  lay 
their  hands  on.  I  failed  to  get  another  chair 
for  some  weeks,  and  had  a  pretty  rough  time  of 
it,  though,  as  it  was  a  very  slack  season,  I  did 


THE  LOWEST  DEPTH         225 

not  lose  much.  Early  in  August  I  got  a  shabby 
old  three-wheeler  with  which  I  had  little  success, 
but  I  managed  to  keep  it  on  for  nine  or  ten  months. 
The  man  to  whom  Smith  let  the  chair  I  had  before 
I  was  arrested  had  it  about  a  month,  paying  no 
rent. 

There  was  one  advantage  in  being  in  prison. 
There  was  no  rent  collector  to  worry  one  on 
Mondays.  And  then  I  had  more  substantial 
and  more  regular  meals  than  I  usually  did  at 
home.  Eating,  sleeping  and  reading  helped  to 
pass  the  time  and  break  the  monotony. 


CHAPTER  XXV 

SOME  MORE  OF   OUR  HOMES  AND  A  FEW  OF 
OUR  LODGERS 

THE  first  lot  of  furniture  we  got  together  we 
kept  for  about  four  years.  Then  I  voluntarily 
surrendered  the  greater  part  of  it  to  a  landlord 
to  whom  I  owed  some  rent.  It  was  not  sold 
for  a  long  while  afterwards,  and  no  account 
was  ever  rendered  to  me  of  what  it  fetched.  I 
heard,  casually,  that  it  realized  far  more  than  I 
owed.  It  was  made  up  mainly  of  things  bought 
on  the  hire  purchase  system.  An  extremely 
slack  time  following  upon  the  declaration  of 
war  in  South  Africa  induced  me  to  let  it  go.  I 
had  earned  nothing  for  twelve  days.  The  chair- 
owner  I  was  drawing  for  at  the  time  was  press- 
ing me,  and  though  my  wife  and  her  mother 
were  working,  their  combined  earnings  hardly 
found  us  in  necessaries.  Our  rent  was  ten 
shillings  a  week.  We  moved  into  a  furnished 
room  for  which  we  paid  four  shillings,  and  Kate's 
mother  went  to  live  at  the  place  where  she  was 
employed. 

226 


SOME  OF  OUR  HOMES        227 

Earlier  we  had  a  nice  flat  over  a  shop,  where 
we  let  off  one  room  and  so  managed  very  well. 
A  new  manager  was  appointed  in  the  shop,  and 
as  he  wanted  our  flat  we  had  to  go,  though  we 
paid  our  rent  regularly.  Here  I  collected  my 
best  library  during  a  fairly  good  summer,  but 
it  had  to  go  in  the  winter  for  food.  I  have 
never  been  able  to  keep  anything  saleable  or 
pawnable  we  could  do  without.  But  we  had 
some  fun  there.  Many  people  visited  us,  and 
we  had  musical  evenings.  There  was  a  rare 
Christmas  party  at  which  we  had  about  a  dozen 
friends.  I  played  the  mandoline,  violin  and 
flute  a  very  little — just  well  enough  to  knock 
tunes  out  of  them,  but  I  could  never  keep  an 
instrument  long  enough  to  learn  it  properly. 
The  pawnshop  invariably  claimed  it  sooner  or 
later.  I  was  always  fond  of  singing.  I  and 
my  wife  Kate  had  the  same  taste  in  songs.  We 
preferred  ballads,  old  and  new.  She  was  once 
selected  for  special  praise  by  Princess  Christian 
when  she  was  singing  at  a  concert  at  Windsor. 
For  my  part,  my  voice  had  always  been  un- 
reliable. Sometimes  I  have  moved  an  audience 
to  wonder;  people  have  exclaimed  that  they 
did  n  t  think  I  "had  it  in  me."  At  another  time 
I  cannot  sing  a  note. 

One  or  two  of  my  friends  are  professional 
singers.  Of  course,  I  cannot  begin  to  sing  so 
well  as  they,  but  I  have  heard  plenty  of  people 


228  GEORGE  MEEK 

on  the  stage  singing  far  worse  than  I  do  when 
I  am  in  "form."  About  this  time  we  knew 
some  very  nice  people  whom  we  used  to  visit. 
They  were  a  kind  of  hybrid  between  work-  and 
trades-people — very  select  in  their  way,  but  fond 
of  a  little  fun.  We  usually  spent  our  Sun- 
day evenings  together,  either  at  their  house  or 
our  flat.  They  had  a  large  place  in  "Colon- 
nade Gardens, "  where  they  let  lodgings.  One 
of  their  boarders  was  a  cockney  girl  who, 
when  it  came  to  her  turn  to  sing,  used  to  give 
us — 

"Aw  we  to  pawt  like  this,  Bill, 
Aw  we  to  pawt  this  wye?" 

There  was  a  piano  at  their  house  which  no 
one  of  us  could  play,  but  my  mandoline  and  a 
banjo  were  requisitioned.  They  were  all  Irenes, 
Ethels  and  Mauds.  Even  the  raucous  cockney 
was  "Irene."  There  was  a  fair  elder  sister 
named  commonplace  "Kate,"  with  whom  I  fell 
in  love,  but  when  I  smelt  her  breath  I  thought 
it  far  too  drastic. 

I  suppose  my  readers  will  know  that  even 
married  men  are  liable  to  fall  in  love  sometimes 
with  other  women  than  their  own  wives.  It  is 
a  stupid  trick,  and  really  only  a  compliment  to 
the  other  women;  only,  when  one  is  not  allowed 
by  fate  to  have  the  one  woman  in  whom  one 
can  bury  oneself  for  the  rest  of  one's  days, 


SOME  OF  OUR  HOMES        229 

these   declensions,    nearly   always   harmless   and 
evanescent  as  they  are,  are  excusable. 

After  we  left  this  flat  we  took  a  small  tenement 
over  some  stables,  which  was  sub-let  to  us  by  a 
madwoman.  Here  my  son  Jocelyn  was  born. 
We  paid  our  way,  but  left  because  we  could  n't 
stand  the  landlady,  who  was  more  often  drunk 
than  sober,  and,  besides,  the  rooms  swarmed 
with  beetles.  Then  we  tried  two  or  three  houses 
in  which  we  had  no  luck  at  letting.  The  last 
of  these  I  have  described  in  one  of  my  short 
stories.  It  swarmed  with  all  sorts  of  pests,  in- 
cluding rats,  which  we  could  hear  pattering  up 
and  down  the  stairs  as  we  lay  in  bed  at  night, 
trying  to  get  into  our  room.  Even  "Becky," 
the  dog  who  was  with  us  then,  did  not  keep  them 
away.  One  night  I  left  half-a-pound  of  steak 
on  a  plate  on  top  of  the  cupboard  for  Kate  to  take 
for  her  dinner  the  next  day.  In  the  morning  it 
was  gone:  the  rats  had  eaten  it.  It  was  out  of 
the  puppy's  reach. 

I  stood  this  horrible  ramshackle  place  as  long  as 
I  could.  Afterwards  I  called  the  attention  of  the 
Sanitary  Committee  to  the  state  of  it  and  the 
row  in  which  it  stood.  But  the  Town  Clerk  wrote 
and  said  that  the  Town  Council  saw  no  reason 
for  interfering.  This  is  a  "health"  resort.  The 
public  health  authority,  which  is  responsible 
for  its  good  government,  is  so  obsessed  with 
the  fear  of  touching  "private  property"  that 


280  GEORGE  MEEK 

it  is  afraid  to  interfere  with  these  pestifer- 
ous slums,  though  an  exceptionally  hot  summer 
with  a  long  drought  may  any  year  turn  them 
into  hotbeds  of  infection  which  will  spread 
an  epidemic  through  the  place,  causing  in- 
calculable loss  and  suffering  to  thousands  of 
the  inhabitants.  It  seems  to  me  that  most  of 
our  own  "civic  fathers"  seek  election  rather 
for  party  purposes  than  the  good  of  the 
community. 

We  took  another  set  of  rooms  over  a  small 
shop  in  Junction  Road.  A  girl  was  in  charge 
of  the  place  who  was  heavy  in  the  family  way  by 
her  employer.  When  her  time  drew  near  he 
closed  the  shop  and  got  us  to  take  a  small  house 
where  she  could  stay  with  us  during  her  trouble. 
The  man  allowed  her  two  pounds  a  week  for  her 
expenses,  but  she  sent  the  greater  part  of  it 
home  to  her  mother,  who  was  always  worrying 
her  for  money.  She  never  fully  paid  us,  though 
we  charged  her  very  little,  only  eight  shillings 
per  week,  and  Kate  stayed  at  home  to  nurse  her. 
The  child  died  a  short  time  after  its  birth  from 
an  evil  disease. 

I  saw  my  own  child  Jocelyn  in  convulsions, 
and  I  hope  never  to  live  to  watch  anything  so 
painful  again ;  his  poor  little  body  writhing  while 
we  could  do  so  little  to  relieve  him.  And  I  watched 
him  slowly  fade  and  change  till  his  face,  from 
being  that  of  a  little  angel,  became  more  like 


SOME  OF  OUR  HOMES        231 

that  of  a  very,  very  old  man;  but  his  case  was 
nothing  to  be  compared  to  this  poor  child's. 
Its  skin  peeled  off  its  flesh  with  its  clothes! 
Think  of  that,  you  who  live  lightly. 

I  think  that  from  time  to  time  in  this  narrative 
I  have  given  its  readers  a  glimpse  of  my  own 
weaknesses  and  follies.  I  have  my  share,  per- 
haps more  than  my  share.  But  I  claim  that  we, 
who  are  working  for  better  things  in  life, 
although  we  may  have  our  frailties — which  are 
human — have  no  such  crimes  on  our  consciences 
as  have  some  supporters  of  the  old  "respectable" 
order. 

Our  next  lodger  in  the  house,  where  I  gave 
the  landlord  my  goods,  was  a  young  work- 
woman who  was  employed  at  the  same  place  as 
Kate.  A  grey-headed  man  used  to  visit  her 
and  take  her  cycling.  We  naturally  thought 
they  were  simply  an  ordinary  courting  couple, 
but  discovered  afterwards  that  the  man  was 
married  and  had  a  large  family  of  grown-up 
children.  At  last  his  wife  discovered  what  was 
going  on  and  our  lodger  had  to  fly.  She  doted 
on  this  old  man,  though  she  knew  perfectly  well 
that  he  was  married;  but  she  would  not  give 
him  up.  It  was  after  she  had  left  us  that  I  gave 
that  home  up. 

We  remained  in  furnished  rooms  for  about 
nine  months,  and  then  began  to  get  another 
home  together:  the  one  I  lost  while  in  prison. 


232  GEORGE  MEEK 

After  I  came  back  we  lived  in  a  furnished  room, 
where  we  were  literally  eaten  alive  with  house- 
bugs  and  fleas;  the  bugs  used  to  drop  upon 
our  faces  as  we  lay  in  bed.  Then  we  got  our 
third  home  together.  We  have  this  still.  After 
trying  unfurnished  rooms  with  people  who, 
although  we  paid  them  regularly,  gave  us  notice 
in  the  spring  when  unfurnished  rooms  were  diffi- 
cult to  get,  we  took  a  pleasant  little  four-roomed 
flat,  for  which  we  paid  seven  shillings  per  week. 
We  have  a  fair-sized,  pleasant  bedroom  with  a 
grass-green  Morris  wall-paper,  very  restful  to 
the  eyes,  a  little  sitting-room  and  kitchen,  and 
we  sub-let  one  room. 

I  have  been  unfortunate  with  my  lodgers, 
they  have  nearly  always  turned  out  to  be  bad 
characters.  Of  course,  I  am  not  a  Puritan  my- 
self and  have  no  great  right  to  complain,  but 
certainly  some  one  steady  and  quiet  would  be  a 
change.  It  is  true  that  the  neighbourhood  in  which 
our  flat  was  situated,  though  it  contains  some  few 
respectable  but  poor  families,  has  a  very  bad 
reputation,  which  it  deserves.  The  houses  and 
flats  are  mostly  paltry  but  highly-rented.  Only 
those  who  cannot  get  accommodation  in  other 
streets  usually  go  there  to  live.  Often  one  can 
hear  fights  going  on,  men  and  women  shouting 
and  screaming,  using  the  most  abominable 
language.  This  may  happen  any  time  during 
the  night.  Women  of  sinister  reputation  live 


SOME  OF  OUR  HOMES        233 

in  some  of  the  places,  though  the  authorities 
have  tried  to  rid  the  town  of  them.  An  effort 
is  being  made  by  some  of  the  house-owners  to 
clear  these  streets  of  the  bad  characters.  These 
places  are  an  illustration  of  the  contention  made 
by  Mr.  Wells  that  the  people  make  the  slums, 
for  they  have  not  been  built  long,  and  had  they 
been  properly  cared  for  they  might  have  made 
passable  homes.  I  understand,  however,  that  a 
good  deal  of  old  timber  was  used  in  their  con- 
struction, and  the  ground,  originally  marsh- 
land, was  made  up  with  house  refuse.  Hence 
the  vermin  in  many  of  them.  Except  for  the 
nimble  flea,  which  at  times  appears  to  be 
ubiquitous  in  our  town,  our  flat  was  free  from 
pests. 

I  long  for  a  quiet  home  in  the  country,  with 
birds  and  trees  and  flowers.  I  have  to  live  in 
the  dusty  town.  I  long  to  work  quietly.  I 
have  to  struggle  on  in  an  environment  of  din 
and  squalor  and  vice.  I  desire  plenty  of  work 
so  that  I  can  pay  my  way  and  we  can  provide 
ourselves  with  the  necessaries  of  life.  I  have 
to  waste  more  than  half  my  days  in  idleness.  I 
am  worried  from  year's  end  to  year's  end.  We 
cannot  clothe  ourselves  decently,  nor  always  get 
good  or  enough  food. 

Yes,  I  am  discontented.  I  have  a  right  to  be 
discontented.  I  should  be  unworthy  of  my 
manhood  if  I  was  not.  I  have  preached  the 


234  GEORGE  MEEK 

gospel  of  discontent  to  others  and  I  shall  preach 
it  all  the  time  I  have  the  strength.  I  have  no 
patience  and  little  pity  for  the  slave  who  loves 
his  chains. 


CHAPTER  XXVI 

THE  PLEASURES  OF  LIFE 

APART  from  my  books,  my  work  for  the  Social- 
ist movement,  and  my  attempts  at  literature  of 
late  years,  my  recreations  have  been  necessarily 
limited  by  my  occupation.  Holidays  and  change 
have  been  practically  unknown.  Except  for  the 
fourteen  days  I  spent  in  prison  I  was  out  of 
Eastbourne  only  one  half  day  during  twelve 
years ! 

After  having  been  employed  behind  the  scenes 
a  long  while,  the  theatre  would  not  appeal  to 
me  even  if  I  could  afford  to  go  to  it,  except  when 
D'Oyly  Carte  or  grand  opera  is  being  presented. 
It  usually  happens,  however,  that  when  this  is 
the  case  I  have  a  run  of  bad  luck  and  cannot 
spare  the  necessary  money. 

Now  and  then  on  a  wet  day  or  in  the  evening 
I  used  to  play  dominoes,  but  I  have  wearied  of 
public-houses  and  public-house  company.  I 
have  given  up  singing  in  public.  There  are 
few  opportunities  except  in  company  for  which 
I  do  not  care. 

235 


236  GEORGE  MEEK 

The  books  I  have  read  have  been  sundry  and 
manifold,  covering  some  of  the  best  productions 
of  all  ages,  from  early  Greece  to  modern  France 
and  America.  I  have  still  many  I  wish  to  read, 
though:  Whitman's  Leaves  of  Grass,  Jefferies', 
Sorrow's  and  Edward  Carpenter's  works,  be- 
sides some  of  Zola's  novels.  I  esteem  Zola  the 
greatest  writer  of  modern  times. 

In  science  my  aim  has  been  to  get  as  near  the 
truth  as  to  the  meaning  of  life  as  I  could.  Psy- 
chology and  biology  have  been  my  favourite 
studies.  I  owe  much  to  Furneaux,  Jordan  and 
the  cheap  reprints  issued  by  the  Rationalist 
Press  Association. 

I  am  not  an  agnostic  from  choice:  I  cannot 
see  the  possibility  of  the  existence  of  an  all-good, 
all-wise  God.  I  cannot  express  my  point  of  view 
better  than  by  quoting  an  extract  from  a  letter 
of  Charles  Darwin  which  appeared  in  the  Sunday 
Chronicle  yesterday — 

"I  am  aware  that  if  we  admit  a  first  cause 
the  mind  still  craves  to  know  whence  it  came 
and  how  it  arose.  Nor  can  I  overlook  the  diffi- 
culty from  the  amount  of  suffering  through  the 
world.  .  .  .  The  safest  conclusion  seems  to  be 
that  the  whole  subject  is  beyond  the  scope  of 
man's  intellect." 

And,  after  all,  what  does  it  matter  what  we 
believe  or  don't  believe?  A  belief  in  the  Chris- 
tian dogmas  does  not  appear  to  make  the 


THE  PLEASURES  OF  LIFE     237 

majority  of  men  either  better  or  worse.  After 
all,  as  individuals  we  are  like  grains  of  dust  on 
a  great  wheel.  Whatever  we  may  think  of  it, 
or  postulate  as  to  the  cause  of  its  revolutions  or 
the  end  to  which  it  is  going,  it  will  still  go  on 
undeterred  by  any  opinions  or  speculations  of 
ours.  We  attach  a  great  deal  too  much  im- 
portance to  our  individualities,  for  after  all  what 
are  we? 

"  The  eternal  Saki  from  His  bowl  hath  poured 
Millions  of  bubbles  like  us,  and  will  pour." 

To  hear  some  Christians  talk  one  would  think 
the  Creator  and  Ruler  of  the  universe  they 
postulate  has  fits  every  time  a  mere  mortal 
doubts  or  denies  His  existence  or  questions  the 
probability  of  some  of  His  attributes  as  con- 
ceived by  a  tribe  of  ignorant  semi-savages  two 
or  three  thousand  years  ago. 

Had  I  remained  ignorant  of  the  hard  facts 
of  life,  never  studied,  and  been  comfortably 
situated,  it  is  possible  I  might  have  kept  my 
religion. 

When  we  are  not  too  much  worried  we  have 
a  little  singing  at  home.  My  daughter  Milly 
is  fond  of  singing  and  picks  up  fresh  songs 
very  quickly.  Our  voices  are  all  we  can  afford 
to  keep.  They  will  not  take  them  in  at  the  local 
pawnbroker's. 

Then  the  little  writing  I  do  is  some  consola- 


238  GEORGE  MEEK 

tion.  A  few  stray  verses  have  already  been  pub- 
lished; one  song  set  to  music.  I  sometimes 
indulge  in  story-telling  and  word-painting  in 
the  way  of  sketches.  Competent  people  tell  me 
they  are  passable,  but  the  market  seems  to  be 
overcrowded. 

Naturally  my  study  is  irregular  and  much 
determined  by  what  I  can  get.  George  Moore 
and  Thomas  Hardy  appeal  to  me  most  amongst 
well-known  English  writers,  but  there  are  some 
coming  men  who  will  bear  watching  each  in  his 
own  sphere,  and  Neil  Lyons  among  them. 
Amongst  contemporary  journals  I  prefer  the 
New  Age,  the  Clarion  and  the  Sunday  Chronicle. 
Very  few  others  appeal  to  me  except  the  high- 
priced  reviews  and  magazines — the  American 
magazines  for  preference.  .  .  . 

In  this  place  the  screeching  and  squealing  of 
children,  the  cursing  of  drunken  or  half-drunken 
men  and  brawling  or  screaming  women  rob 
one's  home  life  of  the  quiet  rest  one  needs  for 
study  and  good  work.  I  have  said  in  a  previous 
chapter  that  I  sometimes  have  a  pint  or  two  of 
beer.  It  seems  sometimes  that  I  must  either 
have  a  deep  drink  or  follow  the  other  seven 
chair-men  to  the  county  asylum,  the  strain  is 
so  great,  it  reaches  almost  to  the  breaking  point. 
"Let  the  poor  man  drink  and  forget  his  misery." 
It  costs  me  less  for  a  week's  beer  than  it  does 
for  the  wine  consumed  by  some  single  members  of 


THE  PLEASURES  OF  LIFE    239 

the  exploiting  class  at  one  meal.  With  a  monot- 
onous worrying  occupation  one  must  have  some 
safety  valve.  The  nerves  become  overwrought. 
Often  the  limbs  ache  from  long  standing  and 
watching  for  work.  One  gets  tired,  faint  and 
numbed  for  want  of  proper  and  sufficient  food. 
In  the  summer  one  is  baked  standing  in  the  sun, 
in  the  winter  blown  about  and  shivering  in  the 
bitter  winds. 

Besides  I  am  by  nature  inordinately  vain,  and 
I  need  some  counteracting  weakness  to  keep  me 
befittingly  humble. 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

MY  SOCIALIST  WORK 

AFTER  the  Eastbourne  Fabian  Society  had 
melted  away  in  1893,  I  took  no  active  part  in 
politics  till  1895;  then  being  rather  better  off,  I 
spent  a  good  deal  of  money  distributing  copies 
of  the  Clarion  and  the  cheap  reprint  of  Merrie 
England.  Of  the  latter  I  sold  or  gave  away  over 
five  hundred  copies.  The  result  was  the  birth  of 
a  new  local  Socialist  organization.  We  called 
ourselves  the  "Clarion  Scouts,"  and  met  in  vari- 
ous coffee-houses.  From  one  of  them  we  were 
expelled  by  the  proprietor,  who  had  been  fright- 
ened into  doing  so  by  a  local  carpenter,  a  rabid 
Tory,  who  told  him  we  were  anarchists  and 
engaged  in  the  manufacture  of  bombs. 

Our  Fabian  Society  had  consisted  mainly  of 
reporters  and  comps.  The  "Scouts"  contained 
mostly  comps  and  carpenters.  They  were  all 
bright,  intelligent  young  men.  In  those  days 
the  Socialist  party  was  the  party  of  all  the  talents. 
It  was  small,  but  select.  Now  the  Lord  only 
knows  what  to  call  it.  We  again  had  our  old 

240 


MY  SOCIALIST  WORK         241 

friend  H.  R.  Smart  to  speak  for  us.  At  this, 
as  at  his  previous  meeting  in  '93,  he  had  the  irre- 
pressible Quirk,  a  well-known  local  heckler,  to  deal 
with;  and  it  was  generally  admitted  that  he  tied 
him  up  into  knots.  Among  our  members  was  a 
young  actor  who  was  resting.  He  proved  a 
tower  of  strength  to  us  with  his  acute  common- 
sense  and  knowledge  of  the  world.  In  the  autumn 
a  local  House  of  Commons  was  formed;  some  of 
us  joined  it,  sitting  on  the  cross  benches.  I  was 
member  for  N.-E.  Manchester.  I  wanted  to  sit 
for  South -West  Ham,  but  some  one  else  was  before 
me.  We  had  some  rare  fun,  joining  in  most  of  the 
debates.  We  had  one  sitting  allotted  to  us,  when 
I  moved  a  resolution  in  favour  of  the  Initiative 
and  Referendum.  It  was  a  packed  house,  and  I 
suppose  I  made  myself  interesting,  as  I  was  granted 
an  extension  of  time.  The  motion  was  defeated 
by  four  votes — fifty-six  against,  fifty-two  for. 

This  was  the  year  of  my  marriage.  The  next 
spring  I  got  into  trouble,  and  went  to  London 
to  look  for  different  work.  There  I  heard  Mr. 
H.  M.  Hyndmann  at  the  old  S.  D.  F.  Hall  in  the 
Strand. 

Once  before  when  I  was  in  London  I  got  in 
touch  with  one  or  two  men  at  the  Communist 
Club  near  Tottenham  •  Court  Road,  and  at  the 
"Club  Autonomie"  in  the  same  neighbourhood. 
At  the  latter  I  spent  the  greater  part  of  one 
night  at  a  concert  and  ball.  The  anarchists 

16 


242  GEORGE  MEEK 

who  formed  the  club  evidently  knew  how  to 
enjoy  themselves.  They  had  the  assistance  of 
several  music-hall  artistes  late  in  the  evening 
after,  I  suppose,  they  had  fulfilled  their  engage- 
ments. The  next  night  I  attended  a  meeting  of 
the  group,  when  they  talked  "business,"  most 
of  which  appeared  to  be  very  inconsequential. 
Among  them  was  an  ex-Fenian  and  a  philosophical 
Englishman  who  had  travelled  a  great  deal.  This 
man  gave  a  long  account  of  a  community  estab- 
lished in  one  of  the  Western  States — Montana  or 
Washington — which  had  realized  and  lived  the 
simple  life.  One  of  our  own  members  at  East- 
bourne gave  us  a  long  account  of  the  Oneida 
Community  at  one  of  our  meetings.  I  have  always 
been  deeply  interested  in  these  efforts  to  realize 
a  better  life.  I  suppose  the  failure  of  most  of  these 
Collectivist  colonies  is  mainly  due  to  the  fact  that 
man  has  not  yet  developed  sufficiently  to  live  the 
higher,  more  unselfish  life  it  demands. 

At  the  same  time  I  believe  I  am  right  in  say- 
ing that  the  Oneida  Community  would  not  have 
failed  but  for  the  interference  of  the  state  author- 
ities, and  in  the  island  of  Tristan  da  Cunha, 
where  there  is  neither  workhouse  nor  prison 
(there  being  neither  crime  nor  pauperism  to  make 
such  institutions  necessary),  we  have  an  example 
of  what  might  be  expected  to  follow  were  So- 
ciety to  resolve  itself  into  the  Collectivist  form 
generally. 


MY  SOCIALIST  WORK         243 

While  I  was  in  London  my  letters  were  sent  to 
the  old  Clarion  office  at  Fleet  Street,  where  I 
used  to  call  for  them ;  but  I  never  saw  any  of  the 
staff  except  "The  Mac  Wilkinson,"  and  unfor- 
tunately my  name  has  never  figured  on  the 
Clarion  pay-sheet.  The  dear  old  "Bounder" 
had  met  with  a  cycle  accident,  and  was  in  hos- 
pital with  a  damaged  arm.  I  read  of  his  death 
a  short  time  after  my  return  to  Eastbourne,  and, 
I  am  not  ashamed  to  say  it,  I  happen  to  know 
that  Julia  Dawson's  washerwoman  was  not  the 
only  one  who  cried  over  that  calamity.  Just  as 
I  always  read  A.  Neil  Lyons  now-a-days  imme- 
diately I  get  my  Clarion,  I  used  then  to  read  the 
"Bounder."  He  was  a  most  delightful  compan- 
ion in  print.  In  fact,  when  he  used  to  write  the 
immortal  "front  page" — immortal  in  the  mem- 
ories of  those  who  read  and  prized  it — I  used 
sometimes  to  wish  he  would  say  more  and  use  a 
smaller  number  of  stars.  There  were  giants  in 
the  movement  in  those  days,  men  who  could 
wield  the  "pottle-pot"  as  well  as  the  pen;  men 
who  even  if  they  suffered  occasionally  with  a 
number  nine  hump,  could  also  smile  on  occasion 
with  a  number  nine  smile.  But  now-a-days  we 
have  to  conform  to  the  manners  and  are  expected 
to  have  the  intelligence  of  Sunday  school  scholars. 
I  wonder  how  many  "  Clarion  Fellowships"  would 
consider  a  man  like  Pay  tame  and  "respectable" 
enough  to  be  admitted  to  their  membership? 


244  GEORGE  MEEK 

When  I  returned  to  Eastbourne  I  had  very 
little  work  for  a  long  time,  and  could  not  help 
the  Scouts  at  all.  They  gradually  fell  away,  and 
the  organization  ceased  to  exist.  While  unem- 
ployed this  time  I  was  given  casual  jobs  by 
Walter  Stretton,  who  had  set  up  in  business  for 
himself,  and  Mr.  Fowler,  the  well-known  book- 
seller in  Cornfield  Road.  I  have  to  thank  the 
latter  for  many  kindnesses. 

When  I  got  back  to  work  again  I  made  several 
unsuccessful  efforts  to  form  another  local  Social- 
ist society,  but  though  I  failed  I  got  to  know  one 

of  my  best  friends,  Edward  C of  Hastings, 

who  has  remained  my  friend  "through  good  re- 
port and  ill  report"  ever  since.  For  some  years, 
being  the  greater  part  of  the  time  the  only  Social- 
ists in  our  respective  towns,  we  maintained  a 
regular  correspondence,  and  he  biked  over  to 
see  me  every  now  and  then.  Then  he  formed  a 
branch  of  the  S.  D.  F.  at  Hastings,  which  fell 
through  after  a  time,  but  it  put  him  in  touch 
with  E.  J.  Pay,  a  very  active  Socialist  worker 
who  has  been  invaluable  to  the  movement  in 
the  south-eastern  counties  since. 

After  the  general  election  of  '06  I  got  in  touch 
with  other  Clarion  readers  in  Eastbourne.  I  put 
a  notice  in  the  Clarion  convening  a  meeting. 
Seven  attended  this,  and  they  promised  to  bring 
others.  An  "assembly"  of  the  Clarion  Fellow- 
ship was  formed,  of  which  I  was  chosen  secre- 


MY  SOCIALIST  WORK         245 

tary.  In  six  weeks  our  membership  had  grown 
to  twenty-four,  and  in  three  months  to  over 
forty.  We  organized  a  series  of  open-air  meet- 
ings, at  the  first  of  which  we  had  E.  J.  Pay  of 
Tunbridge  Wells  and  Joe  Young  of  Brighton  as 
speakers ;  this  being  a  great  success  we  continued 
them,  and  they  have  been  carried  on  in  the  summer 
months  ever  since. 

Having  succeeded  in  organizing  Eastbourne 
socialistically,  I  turned  my  attention  to  Sussex 
and  the  adjacent  counties.  I  found  there  were  a 
few  societies  scattered  about  them,  but  they  were 
mostly  disconnected  and  they  left  ample  room 
for  more.  So  I  called  a  meeting  at  Eastbourne 
on  the  first  Sunday  in  August,  inviting  representa- 
tives from  the  various  societies  in  Kent,  Sussex, 
Surrey  and  Hampshire  to  attend  with  a  view  of 
forming  a  federation.  The  meeting  was  very 
successful.  I  had  captured  F.  T.  Richards, 
M.P.  for  West  Wolverhampton,  for  the  outdoor 
meetings.  The  room  in  which  we  called  the 
conference  was  all  too  small;  the  people  over- 
flowed into  adjoining  rooms  and  half-way  down 
the  stairs.  A  lively  debate  ensued.  All  present 
were  in  favour  of  my  idea,  only  some  wanted  a 
separate  organization  for  each  county,  others 
the  big  scheme  covering  all  four  counties.  Finally 
the  larger  scheme  was  agreed  to,  the  majority 
of  the  Surrey  delegates  dissenting,  but  as  they 
went  away  and  formed  an  organization  on  the 


246  GEORGE  MEEK 

same  lines  for  their  own  county  no  harm  was 
done. 

The  fundamental  idea  in  both  the  South- 
Eastern  and  the  Surrey  County  Federations,  and 
afterwards  the  Essex  County  Committee,  which 
came  into  being  in  imitation  of  what  we  had  done, 
was  to  get  Socialists  of  all  names  and  grades  to 
work  together  for  organization  and  propaganda, 
and  that  idea  has  been  carried  out  in  all  three 
organizations.  They  are  open  alike  to  S.  D.  P.  * 
and  I.  L.  P. 2  branches,  Clarion  organizations,  and 
local  Fabian  and  independent  Socialist  societies. 
Of  course  I  had  been  aware  for  years  of  the 
antagonism  between  I.  L.  P.  'er  and  S.  D.  F.3  'er 
but  I  felt  then,  as  I  feel  now,  that  such  antagonism 
was  unworthy  of  the  Socialist  cause.  Personally, 
though  I  have  had  occasion  to  quarrel  with  the 
official  attitude  of  the  I.  L.  P.,  I  never  had  any 
violent  leanings  either  way.  I  was  always  simply 
a  " Clarionette,"  and  that,  with  a  strong  "New 
Age"  bias,  expresses  my  present  frame  of  mind. 
The  present  strength  of  the  party  in  this  country 
is  undoubtedly  due  more  to  the  efforts  of  the 
Clarion  and  its  writers  than  any  other  one  agency. 

I  was  elected  secretary  of  the  South-Eastern 
Federation,  which  I  at  once  set  to  work  to  estab- 
lish on  a  firm  basis.  I  had  thrown  myself  with 

1  Social  Democratic  Party. 
3  Independent  Labour  Party. 
3  Social  Democratic  Federation. 


MY  SOCIALIST  WORK         247 

the  utmost  enthusiasm  into  the  formation  of  the 
local  "Clarion  Fellowship,"  spending  time  and 
money  upon  it  I  could  ill  afford,  and  making 
enemies  galore;  and  I  did  the  same  with  the 
Federation.  But  I  found  I  could  not  keep  pace 
with  the  work  entailed  by  remaining  secretary 
of  both  organizations,  so  I  gave  up  that  of  the 
local  society  in  favour  of  the  larger  one.  The 
various  branches  in  the  three  counties  rapidly 
sent  in  their  affiliation  papers — and  fees.  Some 
of  the  local  "comrades"  laughed  at  me  when  I 
first  proposed  the  formation  of  the  Federation, 
and  prophesied  failure,  but  I  soon  showed  them 
their  mistake,  and  they  never  forgave  me. 

During  the  first  few  months  I  had  the  help 
of  all  three  recognized  Socialist  organs — the 
Clarion,  Justice  and  the  Labour  Leader.  I  did 
not  appeal  to  the  New  Age  because  that  journal 
does  not  engage  in  the  work  of  organization. 
After  a  time,  however,  the  support  of  the  Labour 
Leader  was  withdrawn.  I  wrote  to  Francis  John- 
son, the  national  secretary  of  the  I.  L.  P.,  asking 
for  the  reason.  He  replied  that  the  N.  A.  C.  were 
forming  exclusively  I.  L.  P.  Federations  through- 
out the  country,  and  that  they  "did  not  approve 
of  hybrid  Federations";  this  in  spite  of  the  fact 
that  they  had  been  instructed  to  "co-operate 
with  other  Socialist  organizations  wherever  pos- 
sible" by  their  own  National  Conference!  Simi- 
larly J.  R.  Macdonald  wrote  a  letter  to  me  telling 


248  GEORGE  MEEK 

me  he  should  advise  the  I.  L.  P.  not  to  co-operate 
with  the  S.  D.  P.  whenever  asked. 

I  saw  that  the  South-Eastern  Federation  was  in 
danger  of  disintegration.  I  was  not  unprepared 
for  this  attack,  because  the  North-Eastern  Social- 
ist Federation  had  been  split  up  by  the  same 
influence  the  previous  year;  and  receiving  intima- 
tion from  one  or  two  local  secretaries  that  the 
work  of  disruption  was  already  beginning,  I 
determined  to  make  a  tour  round  the  three 
counties  to  try  to  stop  it.  Having  been  thrown 
out  of  work  once  more,  I  had  ample  time  on  my 
hands,  and  I  thought  I  might  possibly  see  or 
hear  of  some  other  occupation  in  one  or  the 
other  of  the  towns  I  should  visit. 

I  left  my  wife  and  Milly  at  home,  but  not 
entirely  unprovided  for,  through  the  kindness  of 
some  of  my  friends. 

I  was  thrown  out  of  work  on  Monday  the  I3th 
of  May,  1907,  but  I  waited  until  the  following 
Thursday  before  starting,  as  the  S.  D.  P.  branch 
at  Hastings  held  its  weekly  meeting  on  that 
night.  I  travelled  there  from  Eastbourne  by 
rail-motor,  and  was  very  kindly  received  both  by 
my  old  friends  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Cruttenden  and  the 
local  society.  I  explained  the  object  of  my  tour 
to  them,  and  they  approved  of  it,  giving  me, 
the  former  hospitality  for  the  night,  and  the 
latter  three  shillings  towards  my  expenses. 

The  next  day  I  rode  to  Appledore  and  walked 


MY  SOCIALIST  WORK         249 

the  rest  of  the  way  into  Ashford,  which  was  my 
next  calling  place.  It  was  a  long,  weary  walk 
by  a  flat  winding  road.  I  was  very  low-spirited, 
wondering  whether  I  had  done  right  in  leaving 
home  and  what  would  happen  to  me.  The 
branch  at  Ashford  I  thought  one  of  the  most 
disaffected  ones;  but  it  proved  amenable  to 
reason,  and  has  remained  loyal  ever  since. 

I  was  treated  very  well  indeed  by  the  local 
comrades.  They  subscribed  handsomely  towards 
my  expenses,  and  entertained  me  cordially. 
They  foregathered  every  evening  in  a  small  bar 
at  the  back  of  the  "Saracen's  Head,"  and  I  was 
lodged  in  a  very  quaint  old  house  in  North  Street, 
the  oldest  house,  it  was  said,  in  the  town.  Here 
my  host,  a  baker,  enlivened  the  evenings  with 
selections  from  /  Pagliacci  and  //  Trovatore  on 
a  very  good  gramophone. 

I  stayed  in  Ashford  from  Friday  till  Monday. 
On  the  Sunday  evening  some  of  the  members  of 
the  branch  took  me  for  a  walk  towards  Canter- 
bury. We  passed  through  some  woods  which 
were  literally  carpeted  with  bluebells.  On  the 
Monday  morning  I  and  my  host  ran  to  the  station 
to  catch  an  early  train  to  Folkestone,  but  missed 
it  by  the  fraction  of  a  second.  Ashford  is  a  land- 
lord- and  parson-ridden  place  where  the  Socialists 
have  to  lie  very  low. 

On  reaching  Folkestone  I  first  called  upon  an 
old  stalwart  of  the  movement  named  Harry 


250  GEORGE  MEEK 

Brown,  with  whom  I  had  been  corresponding 
with  reference  to  the  formation  of  a  local  branch 
of  the  I.  L.  P.  He  had  formerly  worked  with 
Will  Crooks  in  Poplar,  and  was  active  in  the 
great  Dock  Strike  in  London.  However,  as  he 
was  leaving  Folkestone  for  Caterham,  he  could 
do  nothing  there;  but  a  branch  has  been  formed 
since,  and  is,  I  believe,  thriving. 

I  had  also  had  some  correspondence  with  Mr. 
H.  G.  Wells  on  the  subject  of  a  local  organiza- 
tion, it  being  part  of  my  duty  as  secretary  of 
the  Federation  to  hunt  up  Socialists  who  lived  in 
unorganized  towns  and  districts,  and  to  get 
them,  if  possible,  to  form  societies.  So  I  made 
my  way  to  his  beautiful  house  at  Sandgate,  won- 
dering what  kind  of  a  reception  I  should  meet 
with.  Although  I  was  flushed  with  my  success 
at  Ashford,  I  must  confess  I  felt  awkward  and 
nervous,  but  Mr.  Wells  received  me  kindly  and 
asked  me  to  return  later  to  lunch. 

It  being  early,  about  ten  o'clock  in  fact,  I 
took  a  long  walk  over  the  beautiful  Leas  down 
into  Folkestone.  En  passant  I  had  a  talk  with 
some  bathchair-men  whom  I  saw  on  their  stands. 
They  did  not  appear  very  prosperous,  and  told  me 
that  where  they  hired  their  chairs  they  paid  their 
owners  a  third  of  their  takings  for  the  use  of  them. 
This,  considering  the  uncertainty  of  the  work, 
is  far  more  equitable  than  a  standing  weekly  rent. 

I  found  the  Leas  very  exhilarating,  but  was  sur- 


MY  SOCIALIST  WORK         251 

prised  to  see  so  few  people  round  the  band  for  a 
Bank  Holiday. 

Returning  to  Spade  House,  Mr.  Wells  asked 
me  into  his  fine  study,  where  we  discussed  the 
work  I  was  doing.  Afterwards  we  went  in  to 
lunch,  at  which  function  I  felt  particularly  awk- 
ward, because  always  at  public  or  private  meals 
I  had  had  the  various  viands  placed  on  my 
plate  in  front  of  me.  But  here  I  found  I  was  ex- 
pected to  help  myself  from  dishes  passed  over 
my  shoulder  by  the  attendant  parlourmaid.  How- 
ever, Mr.  and  Mrs.  Wells  chatted  easily  of  the 
Socialist  movement  in  England  and  America — 
we  were  all  interested  just  then  in  the  fate  of 
Meyer,  Heywood  and  Pettibone,  the  officials  of 
the  Western  Federation  of  Miners  who  were  on 
trial  in  Idaho  for  murder.  There  was  another 
guest  present,  and  after  lunch  our  host  showed 
us  over  the  gardens,  which  overlooked  the  sea 
at  such  a  great  height  that  cross-channel  steamers 
appeared  no  larger  than  small  row-boats.  We 
had  coffee  and  cigarettes  on  the  lawn,  where  one 
of  Mr.  Wells'  little  sons  brought  me  some  pansies. 

I  found  Folkestone  in  the  afternoon  crowded 
with  Cockney  and  French  trippers,  so  as  there 
was  nothing  further  for  me  to  do  there  I  went 
on  by  rail  to  Dover.  Here  the  I.  L.  P.  branch 
was  installed  in  convenient  club-rooms  in  Big- 
gan  Street,  just  above  the  Market  Square.  I 
liked  Dover.  It  seemed  a  free  and  easy  kind  of 


252  GEORGE  MEEK 

place.  I  made  friends  with  a  local  hotel-keeper 
and  a  telephone  employee,  both  of  them  members 
of  the  I.  L.  P.,  and  they  took  me  about  a  good 
deal.  I  addressed  an  open-air  meeting  in  the 
Market  Square,  and  one  of  a  branch  of  the  Rail- 
way Women's  Guild  at  the  I.  L.  P.  Club. 

The  first  object  which  met  my  eyes  when  I 
awoke  in  the  morning  was  the  castle,  symbol 
of  the  oppression  and  the  power  of  the  dominat- 
ing predatory  classes  looking  down  on  the 
emissary  of  revolt.  The  Dover  people  were  very 
kind.  During  my  stay  I  received  ten  shillings 
from  J.  Taylor  Clarke,  the  National  Secretary 
of  the  Clarion  Fellowship,  towards  my  expenses. 
Though  when  I  wrote  him  for  assistance  I  meant 
it  in  the  way  of  information  and  advice,  the  finan- 
cial help  was  welcome. 

From  Dover  I  went  by  train  to  Ramsgate, 
where,  although  there  was  no  branch,  I  had  a 
correspondent.  He,  however,  was  not  at  home, 
so  I  took  the  electric  tram  into  Margate.  Here 
it  was  proposed  to  form  some  sort  of  a  society 
with  the  help  of  A.  J.  Webster,  of  the  S.  D.  P. 
executive,  who  had  a  house  in  the  town;  but  as 
there  was  no  occasion  for  me  to  stay  I  pushed 
on  to  Canterbury.  Here  again  I  was  disap- 
pointed: my  correspondent  there,  who  wanted  to 
form  a  local  Fabian  Society,  was  away  at  Deal, 
and  my  funds  were  getting  very,  very  low.  I 
should  like  to  have  stayed  in  the  premier  city, 


MY  SOCIALIST  WORK         253 

too.  Who  has  read  and  reread  David  Copper- 
field  and  would  not? 

So  I  pushed  on  to  Faversham,  riding  part  of 
the  way  and  walking  the  rest  through  miles  of 
hop  fields,  arriving  in  the  evening  tired  out. 

But  John  K ,  my  correspondent  there  (there 

was  no  local  organization),  made  me  very  wel- 
come. He  was  one  of  the  few  men  I  met  on  my 
tour  to  whom  I  took  a  strong  liking.  A  big, 
strongly-built  man,  a  "reader  from  the  first"  of 
the  Clarion,  greatly  interested  in  his  garden,  in 
which  he  cultivated  the  luscious  and  blushing 
tomato.  He  took  me  down  into  the  town  at 
night  and  showed  me  the  old  town  hall  stand- 
ing on  pillars  with  the  market  place  beneath, 
and  the  old  Elizabethan  houses,  spoilt,  many  of 
them,  by  modern  "improvements."  The  streets 
were  crowded  for  a  little  place  like  Faversham. 
It  was  a  Saturday  night,  and  the  people  were 
walking  leisurely  about  the  roadways,  as  there 
was  little  or  no  vehicular  traffic.  It  seemed  a 
beautiful  old  place  to  me,  and  I  fancy  I  should 
like  to  spend  a  good  long  holiday  there. 

Later  we  foregathered  at  an  inn  with  one  or 
two  kindred  spirits.  A  thunderstorm  with  heavy 
rain  came  on,  and  we  sat  and  chatted  till  it  was 
"time."  On  the  Sunday  morning  I  did  a  mean 
thing  purposely.  There  were  four  of  us,  John, 
his  pleasant  wife  and  daughter  and  myself,  and 
there  were  only  three  rashers  of  bacon.  One  of 


254  GEORGE  MEEK 

us  had  to  have  cold  pie,  and  I  decided  that  John 
should.  So  I  ate  his  rasher  with  all  the  more 
relish  because  I  liked  him  and  wanted  to  place 
myself  under  as  much  obligation  as  possible  to 
him.  They  lived  in  a  pleasant  new  house  with 
large  gardens,  the  rent  of  which  was  about  half 
what  such  a  one  would  fetch  in  Eastbourne;  and 
the  local  rates  were  eleven  shillings  in  the 
pound ! 

After  breakfast  John  pointed  out  my  road  to 
Sittingbourne  the  next  town  on  my  itinerary. 
Here,  too,  I  found  my  correspondent,  one  of 
two  brothers  whom  I  had  nicknamed  "The  Busy 
Bs,"  because  of  their  activity  in  the  movement, 
away  at  Chatham.  But  he  returned  shortly 
afterwards,  and  overtook  me  along  the  Sheerness 
road  on  his  bicycle.  He  took  me  to  a  roadside 
inn,  and  "signified  the  same  in  the  usual  way," 
giving  me  two  shillings  besides,  at  which  I  was 
exceeding  glad,  for  I  was  tired,  thirsty,  and 
1 '  broke. ' '  The  other  ' '  Busy  B ' '  had  been  agitat- 
ing at  Westgate-on-Sea,  but  up  to  that  time 
neither  of  them  had  succeeded  in  making  a 
start.  Later  I  had  to  pay  a  penny  to  cross  the 
railway  bridge  to  the  Isle  of  Sheppey,  where  is 
the  ancient  fortress  of  Sheerness.  From  Faver- 
sham  to  Sheerness  was  one  of  my  longest  walks. 

I  received  a  kind  welcome  from  the  comrades 
at  Sheerness.  One  of  them  took  me  to  the 
Working  Men's  Club,  which  they  claim  to  be 


MY  SOCIALIST  WORK         255 

the  finest  out  of  London.  It  certainly  is  a 
handsome  institution,  standing  in  its  own 
grounds,  and  is  the  freehold  property  of  its 
members,  all  of  whom  are  working  men.  It 
has  grown  with  the  co-operative  movement,  and 
has  been  built  up  by  its  members  without  any 
extraneous  aid  or  "patronage."  It  contains 
a  large  lecture-hall,  where  meetings  and  enter- 
tainments are  held  during  the  winter  months, 
and  has  a  large  lawn  for  garden-parties  in  the 
summer.  It  has  a  big  billiard-room — four  tables 
— a  very  capacious  refreshment  bar  devoted  on 
one  side  to  intoxicants  and  on  the  other  to  tea, 
coffee  and  other  temperance  drinks,  in  addition 
to  smoking-  and  reading-rooms,  all  of  which  are 
handsomely  decorated.  Ladies  are  admitted  to 
certain  rooms.  All  profits  are  expended  in 
lectures,  entertainments  and  treats  to  the  mem- 
bers' children.  This  has  been  achieved  by  men 
in  steady  employment  in  the  dockyards. 

I  did  not  see  much  of  the  town,  as  I  left  the 
next  day.  The  branch  was  a  fairly  strong  one, 
but  it  was  not  pushing  its  propaganda  by  open- 
air  meetings  out  of  deference  to  the  feelings  of 
other  people.  It  seemed  strange  here  to  have  to 
climb  up  to  the  sea  instead  of  going  down 
to  it. 

The  next  day  I  went  to  Gillingham,  where 
an  active  agent  of  the  N.  A.  C.  was  secretary 
of  the  local  I.  L.  P.  The  sole  surviving  member 


256  GEORGE  MEEK 

of  the  Strood  S.  D.  P.  entertained  me  at  his  lodg- 
ings in  that  long  street  in  Chatham  which  is 
mentioned  in  Tono-Bungay,  Luton  Street.  Chat- 
ham lies  in  a  hollow  between  hills  almost  as  steep 
as  those  at  Hastings.  Mean  streets  everywhere — 
mean  houses  clustering  close  under  Rochester 
Cathedral.  My  host,  who  was  secretary  of  the 
Chatham  Trades  Council,  was  busy  circulariz- 
ing the  trades  councils  throughout  the  country, 
but  he  proved  urbane  and  informing. 

The  next  morning  I  walked  by  way  of  Graves- 
end  and  Dartford  to  Bexley  Heath — a  long, 
tiring  walk,  the  first  part  of  the  way  through  the 
Dickens  country.  My  funds  were  very,  very 
low.  At  Gravesend  nearly  every  one  appeared 
to  be  out  of  work,  but  there  was  an  active  I.  L.  P. 
Club  with  a  Socialist  Sunday  school  attached. 
At  Dartford  E.  V.  Hartley  gave  me  a  ripping 
tea  and  a  shilling,  so  I  boarded  the  electric  tram 
into  Bexley  Heath. 

Here,  and  at  Erith  the  next  day,  I  found  a 
good  deal  of  active  work  going  on.  In  the 
wife  of  the  comrade  who  put  me  up  I  met  one 
of  the  few  active  Socialist  women  workers  I  have 
known.  I  stayed  there  two  or  three  days,  and 
then  walked  into  London,  making  my  way  by 
Plumstead,  Woolwich  and  Lewisham.  I  made 
for  the  Clarion  office  thoroughly  tired  out,  but 
no  one  was  in  except  the  MacW.,  then  I  went 
on  to  21 A  Maiden  Lane,  where  I  fared  much 


MY  SOCIALIST  WORK         257 

better.  H.  W.  Lee,  the  secretary  of  the  S.  D.  P., 
was  in;  he  was  as  busy  as  the  proverbial  bee 
in  the  oft-mentioned  tar  barrel,  but  he  made 
time  to  take  me  round  the  corner  and  give  me 
a  good  lunch.  He  also  lent  me  a  shilling. 

It  was  a  dull,  damp  evening.  It  had  been 
raining  the  greater  part  of  the  time  I  had  been 
away  from  Eastbourne,  though  providentially  it 
had  kept  fine  for  me  during  my  long  walks. 

At  night  I  attended  a  meeting  of  the  Clarion 
Van  Committee  at  Chandos  Hall.  I  explained 
the  object  of  my  tour,  and  they  made  a  collec- 
tion for  me  amounting  to  55.  6d.t  which  was 
very  acceptable.  I  forgot  to  mention  that  I  had 
caught  a  severe  cold  at  Margate,  through  which 
I  had  almost  entirely  lost  my  voice.  I  put  up 
at  Bruce  House  in  Drury  Lane  for  the  night, 
my  bed  costing  me  sevenpence.  The  next  morn- 
ing I  rose  early,  and  as  I  could  not  get  a  parcel 
I  had  left  at  the  office,  I  took  a  long  walk 
through  Kingsway  (which  I  had  never  seen  be- 
fore), Oxford  Street  and  Park  Lane  back  to 
Bruce  House,  thinking  all  kinds  of  thoughts, 
my  predominating  impression  being  that  I 
should  be  very  glad  to  get  out  into  the  country 
again. 

After  waiting  impatiently  for  some  time  I  got 
my  parcel  from  the  office  at  Bruce  House,  and 
having  paid  H.  W.  Lee  the  shilling  he  so  kindly 
lent  me,  took  train  to  Penge,  my  first  calling 

17 


258  GEORGE  MEEK 

place  on  my  homeward  journey.  Here  I  had 
a  vegetarian  dinner  with  A.  J.  Taylor  and  his 
wife.  He  had  been  a  frequent  speaker  for  us 
at  Eastbourne,  so  that  it  was  a  treat  to  see  a 
familiar  face  again 

At  Penge,  Beckenham,  Bromley,  and  round 
about,  our  workers  were  very  active.  I  went 
from  Penge  to  Bromley,  where  I  had  the  honour 
and  pleasure  of  talcing  tea  with  Margaret  Mac- 
Millan,  to  whom,  as  a  member  of  the  N.  A.  C., 
I  was  glad  to  be  able  to  state  my  case.  She 
proved  a  good  listener,  and  fully  sympathized 
with  my  point  of  view.  A  fine,  well-built  Scots- 
woman, she  has  done  yeoman  service  in  the  cause 
of  Socialism,  and  I  shall  always  remember  with 
pleasure  the  afternoon  I  spent  at  her  house. 
She  suggested  she  should  introduce  me  to  Prince 
Kropotkin,  but  we  sat  talking  so  long  that  it  be- 
came too  late,  and  I  had  to  walk  on  to  Sidcup. 

At  Sidcup  I  met  the  second  of  my  two  most 

intimate  friends.  The  first  was  Edward  C of 

Hastings.  This  was  a  comrade  who  had  been 
my  chief  adviser  and  supporter  since  I  had  been 
secretary  of  the  Federation.  I  had  felt  from  his 
letters  that  I  should  like  him,  so  that  I  was  anxious 
to  see  him. 

I  was  more  than  satisfied  with  him.  A  fine, 
tall,  genial  Scot,  urbane  and  cultured.  I  have  n't 
his  permission  to  say  exactly  what  position  he 
fills:  he  is  as  modest  as  he  is  valuable,  and  pre- 


MY  SOCIALIST  WORK         259 

fers  that  his  name  should  be  suppressed.  But 
I  may  say  that  he  occupies  a  responsible  posi- 
tion on  the  staff  of  a  well-known  weekly  journal 
and  that  his  name  is  Hugh.  He  took  me  to  a 
friend's,  where  I  stayed  till  the  Sunday,  he, 
of  course,  spending  as  much  time  with  us  as  he 
possibly  could,  but  not  half  so  much  as  I  should 
have  liked.  Unfortunately  it  rained  the  greater 
part  of  the  time,  so  that  a  look  round  the  neigh- 
bourhood was  out  of  the  question.  I  gathered 
that  the  local  I.  L.  P.  had  been  subjected  to  the 
fire  of  bourgeois  persecution,  many  of  its  mem- 
bers having  been  discharged  from  their  work 
and  given  notice  to  quit  their  houses  because 
of  their  political  opinions.  On  Sunday  morning 
we  walked  by  way  of  Chislehurst  to  the  nearest 
railway  station  for  Sevenoaks,  a  pleasant  walk 
enlivened  by  tales  and  talk.  Hugh  assisted  me 
financially  as  well  as  by  his  friendly  encourage- 
ment. 

Several  years  previous  to  this,  when  we 
Socialists  in  the  South  of  England  were  like 
the  elect,  "one  of  a  city  and  two  of  a  tribe," 
on  one  of  my  occasional  pilgrimages  to  London 
in  search  of  employment  I  had  made  the 
acquaintance  of  a  comrade  at  Sevenoaks,  and  I 
looked  forward  to  meeting  him  again.  It  was 
the  postmaster  at  Sevenoaks  who  had  told  me 
where  to  find  him  on  my  previous  visit.  He 
had  happened  to  be  at  home,  alone  in  the  house, 


260  GEORGE  MEEK 

and  he  had  regaled  me  with  bottled  beer  and 
jam  tarts,  while  he  read  extracts  of  a  play  he 
was  writing.  On  this  occasion  he  was  at  the 
station  to  meet  me,  but  I  did  not  recognize 
him.  However  he  was  pointed  out  to  me,  and 
after  showing  me  a  new  club  house  and  some 
pretty  cottages  they  had  built  through  the  local 
co-operative  society,  he  gave  me  dinner  at  the 
"Yew  Tree,"  regretting  he  could  not  take  me 
home  as  he  and  some  friends  were  going  away 
that  afternoon  to  a  picnic.  The  Sevenoaks 
Clarion  Fellowship  was  one  of  the  eleven 
societies  brought  into  being  during  my  year  of 
office  owing  directly  or  indirectly  to  our 
agitation. 

I  found  I  should  have  to  wait  some  time  for 
the  next  train  to  Tunbridge,  so  I  decided  to 
walk,  hoping  to  get  there  in  time  to  see  the  local 
secretary  and  catch  the  train  to  Tunbridge  Wells, 
where  I  was  anxious  to  spend  the  night.  How- 
ever, it  took  longer  than  I  thought,  so  I  had  to 
give  the  Tunbridge  branch  a  "bye."  The  roads 
about  this  part  of  Kent  are  very  beautiful,  so 
I  suppose  that  is  why  I  did  not  hurry.  I  reached 
the  "Wells"  early  in  the  evening,  and  had  some 
difficulty  in  finding  the  local  secretary.  I  had 
forgotten  that  they  held  afternoon  meetings  on 
the  Common,  and  it  seems  that  while  I  was 
searching  for  him  he  was  inquiring  for  me. 
However,  I  found  one  of  the  S.  D.  P.ers  at  last, 


MY  SOCIALIST  WORK         261 

and  my  old  friend  Joe  Young,  who  was  the 
speaker  for  the  day,  at  tea  with  him.  This  was 
quite  satisfactory.  I  listened  to  a  discourse 
at  night  on  "The  Reward  of  Genius,"  which 
interested  the  crowd  so  much  that  they  stayed 
till  nearly  ten  o'clock,  and  I  had  to  make  a  bolt 
into  a  closing  pub  to  get  some  tobacco — it  was 
too  late  for  a  glass  of  beer. 

The  next  morning,  instead  of  turning  to  the 
left  to  Maidstone,  as  I  should  have  done,  the 
magnet  of  home  drew  me  back  to  Eastbourne. 
I  walked  to  Heathfield,  from  which  I  rode  to 
Hailsham  to  give  myself  a  rest,  and  then  walked 
the  rest  of  the  way  home,  where  I  was  wel- 
comed by  Kate  and  Mildred  after  my  long 
journey. 

Joe  Young  had  invited  me  to  go  over  to 
Brighton  and  give  an  account  of  my  tour  and  of 
the  causes  which  led  me  to  undertake  it  to  his 
society,  the  S.  D.  P.  I  walked  the  twenty-three 
miles  and  found  it  very  tiring.  However,  I  did 
not  regret  it  afterwards,  for  I  found  the  Brighton 
comrades  most  kind,  not  to  say  cordial.  They 
fully  approved  of  what  I  had  done  for  the  move- 
ment, and  at  the  suggestion  of  Will  Evans,  a 
most  useful  speaker  who  was  at  the  time  on  the 
Town  Council,  they  gave  me  quite  a  handsome 
collection.  I  stayed  the  night  with  Joe  Young. 
I  had  not  quite  made  up  my  mind  whether  to 
go  on  by  way  of  Worthing  to  Portsmouth  and 


262  GEORGE  MEEK 

Southampton  or  to  return  to  Eastbourne.  As 
it  poured  in  torrents  the  next  morning  and  I 
had  no  overcoat  with  me,  I  decided  upon  turn- 
ing back.  There  was  really  no  occasion  for  me 
to  go  on,  as  I  had  no  reason  to  think  the  Hamp- 
shire comrades  disaffected. 

Whenever  I  was  given  an  opportunity  to 
address  the  members  of  the  various  societies,  and 
in  every  case,  except  at  Gillingham,  where  I 
saw  the  secretary,  I  was  successful  in  retaining 
and  strengthening  their  adherence  to  the  Federa- 
tion. Everywhere  without  exception  I  was 
treated  with  the  utmost  courtesy  and  kindness, 
and  those  three  weeks  will  always  contain 
fragrant  memories  for  me. 

I  returned  to  Eastbourne  in  the  beginning  of 
June.  Our  annual  conference  was  held  on  the 
first  Sunday  in  August  at  the  Great  Hall 
Restaurant,  Tunbridge  Wells.  Here  a  vote  of 
censure  upon  J.  R.  Macdonald  was  carried  by 
a  large  majority,  although  a  friend  of  his  named 
Paul  Campbell  tried  to  defend  his  position. 
Having  put  the  Federation  on  a  satisfactory 
footing,  I  had  intended  for  a  long  while  to  resign 
my  office  at  the  end  of  the  year;  this  I  did, 
and  a  Tunbridge  Wells  man  named  Veals,  who 
having  greater  leisure  than  I  and  being  a  cyclist 
was  able  to  make  himself  more  useful  to  the 
different  branches.  I  had  carried  out  my  year's 
secretarial  work  at  a  total  cost  of  £2  55. 


MY  SOCIALIST  WORK         263 

The  Federation  is  still  flourishing,  and  I  be- 
lieve the  ideal  it  stands  for — the  co-operation 
of  the  various  sections  of  the  Socialist  party- 
will  ultimately  find  acceptance  throughout  the 
movement.  Just  now  there  is  a  good  deal  of 
ferment  in  it.  On  the  one  hand  is  the  conserva- 
tive element  pulling  towards  mere  Labourism — 
perhaps  Liberalism;  on  the  other  the  uncom- 
promising Socialists  who  see  no  sense  in  being 
led  out  of  the  swamps  of  the  old  political  parties 
with  the  idea  of  forming  a  definite  independent 
Socialist  party  of  their  own  only  to  be  led  back 
again. 

Although  I  have  ceased  to  take  a  very  active 
part  in  politics  for  some  time,  I  am  entirely  in 
sympathy  with  the  latter.  Some  day  the  workers 
will  tire  of  mere  politicians  of  every  shade  and 
will  organize  themselves  for  the  definitive 
struggle  with  Capitalism.  Then,  thoroughly 
grounded  in  the  economics  and  ethics  of  Social- 
ism, they  will  know  what  to  do.  It  will  be  no 
great  loss  to  the  idle  rich  for  them  to  have  to 
live  useful,  healthy  lives,  nor  to  the  business 
man  to  be  relieved  of  the  ever-increasing  strain 
of  competition.  The  worker  will  have  no  fear  of 
unemployment  or  of  want  through  sickness  or 
old  age.  The  reign  of  hatred  engendered  by 
the  competition  of  individuals  and  the  war  of 
classes  will  give  place  to  that  of  "Peace  on  earth, 
goodwill  to  men. " 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 

TRYING  TO   CLIMB 

BEING  free  from  the  duties  imposed  upon  me 
by  my  political  work,  I  set  myself  during  the 
following  winter  to  try  to  solve  a  problem  which 
had  presented  itself  to  me  for  some  time,  i.e., 
how  to  so  improve  the  phonograph  as  to  make 
it,  in  combination  with  the  cinematograph,  pro- 
duce entire  plays  or  operas. 

I  had  no  instrument  of  my  own  with  which  to 
experiment,  nor  means  with  which  to  get  models 
made  to  my  designs;  but  I  studied,  as  far  as  I 
could,  all  the  various  factors  involved,  and 
finally  got  out  a  set  of  drawings  showing  how, 
allowing  for  every  contingency  (as  I  thought), 
the  tubular  records  could  be  lengthened  to 
almost  any  given  extent.  These,  by  a  mechan- 
ism which  I  designed,  could  be  carried  at  the 
right  speed  and  with  the  right  number  of  revolu- 
tions under  the  needle  of  the  phonograph. 

I  submitted  my  drawings  with  explanatory 
notes  to  Messrs.  Pathe  Freres,  the  Edison  Bell 
Record  Co.  and  others,  with  the  same  result: 

264 


TRYING  TO  CLIMB  265 

they  all  "regretted  to  say  they  did  not  think 
my  idea  could  be  made  commercially  successful. " 

I  have  hinted  in  previous  chapters  that  I  have 
written  songs  and  stories  from  time  to  time: 
while  at  the  theatre  I  wrote  a  play  and  submitted 
scenarios  for  two  or  three  musical  comedies  to 
Mr.  George  Edwardes,  but,  like  my  stories,  they 
were  failures. 

After  I  had  grown  tired  of  trying  to  get  my 
phonograph  idea  taken  up,  I  began  to  write 
this  story  at  Mr.  Wells'  suggestion,  varying  it 
with  a  treatise  on  ethics  and  one  or  two  works 
of  fiction,  but  failure  to  get  any  of  these  accepted 
has  instilled  a  much  needed  measure  of  modesty 
into  my  estimate  of  my  own  powers. 

Yet  it  is  needful  that  I  should  do  something 
different  to  bathchair-work.  This  is  growing 
more  unreliable  every  year.  I  began  this  year 
by  being  out  four  weeks  in  January  for  four 
shillings  and  sixpence!  Then  I  had  two  ex- 
periences of  Corporation  relief  work. 

It  was  so  many  years  since  I  had  done  any 
heavy  manual  labour  that  I  looked  forward  to 
my  new  occupation  with  some  misgivings.  I 
understood,  however,  that  I  should  only  be 
employed  a  week,  and,  anyway,  anything  was 
better  than  standing  about  doing  nothing.  So 
with  some  trepidation,  but  a  determination  to 
do  my  best,  I  walked  down  to  the  "relief"  work 
at  the  place  appointed. 


266  GEORGE  MEEK 

It  was  a  bright,  cold  morning,  the  ground 
covered  with  hoar-frost.  I  had  to  walk  rather 
more  than  a  mile  from  my  house;  that,  how- 
ever, made  me  warm.  The  Corporation  was 
laying  out  a  new  recreation  ground  for  the 
people  of  the  East  End,  on  the  Crumbles.  These 
"Crumbles,"  as  they  are  called,  are  wide 
stretches  of  shingle  left  by  the  sea,  which  has 
been  receding  from  this  part  of  the  coast  for 
centuries.  Inland  from  them  lies  Pevensey 
Castle.  This  is  now  fully  two  miles  from  the 
high  water  line.  When  it  was  first  built  the  sea 
washed  its  walls. 

I  found  a  large  number  of  men  of  all  sorts 
and  trades  gathered  round  an  open  fire.  I  gave 
my  post-card  to  the  foreman,  who,  after  blow- 
ing his  whistle  at  eight  o'clock,  directed  the 
men  to  their  various  tasks.  I,  with  others,  had 
to  carry  clay  from  a  large  heap  to  a  man  who 
was  spreading  it  over  the  rough  beach  to  form 
a  foundation  for  the  turf.  It  was  very  heavy 
work.  The  clay  had  to  be  loaded  into  wheel- 
barrows and  run  along  planks  to  the  spreader. 
It  was  hard  to  get  up,  sticky  and  half  frozen, 
and  I,  being  inexperienced,  had  selected  a  poor 
shovel  and  had  not  provided  myself  with  a  pick. 
I  found  I  could  wheel  the  barrows  moderately 
full,  but  not  very  full,  and  that  was  the  one 
and  only  time  I  got  into  trouble  with  the  foreman, 
either  during  the  six  days  I  put  in  on  this  job 


TRYING  TO  CLIMB  267 

or  three  I  had  at  another  later  on.  On  the  second 
day  I  told  him  I  could  not  wheel  the  barrows 
loaded  as  he  wanted  them;  I  told  him  I  did 
not  mind  loading  them,  but  for  me  to  trundle 
them  along  the  planks  was  a  physical  impos- 
sibility. He  jeered  at  me  on  account  of  my  or- 
dinary occupation  as  bathchair-man  but  he 
let  me  have  my  way.  If  he  had  n  't  I  should 
have  had  to  give  up  the  job. 

The  work  made  me  very  stiff.  I  could  scarcely 
walk  home.  When  I  sat  down  anywhere  it  was 
agony  to  get  up  again,  but  I  stuck  to  it  till  the 
Saturday.  The  last  three  days  we  had  to  deal 
with  rough  turf  instead  of  the  heavy  clay,  which 
was  a  change  for  the  better.  But  it  was  still 
very  hard  work,  harder  than  it  need  have  been, 
because,  though  we  had  one  shirker  in  our  gang, 
we  had  two  or  three  men  who  had  got  used  to 
it  and  made  the  pace  rather  warm,  probably 
with  the  hope  of  obtaining  more  employment. 
Besides  the  pain  in  my  back  I  had  one  under 
my  right  shoulder-blade,  which  stayed  with 
me  all  the  time.  We  left  off  work  at  12.30  on 
Saturday.  I  spent  the  afternoon  resting  and 
reading  the  Woman  Worker,  the  New  Age  and 
the  Clarion — I  had  been  too  tired  to  read  all 
the  week.  At  night  I  sat  on  our  kitchen  table 
to  get  near  the  gas  to  read;  in  getting  down 
the  pain  in  my  side  suddenly  intensified  and 
something  seemed  to  turn  over  inside  me.  I 


268  GEORGE  MEEK 

was  almost  helpless;  I  could  not  stoop  to  take 
my  boots  off,  and  managed  to  get  upstairs  only 
with  great  difficulty.  Undressing  and  getting 
into  bed  resolved  itself  into  a  very  labour  of 
Hercules.  I  spent  a  wretched  night:  every 
time  I  moved  or  coughed  I  endured  such  agony 
I  thought  I  should  faint. 

The  next  day  I  could  not  move,  nor  the  next, 
at  which  I  was  sincerely  sorry,  as  I  might  have 
had  three  days  more  work.  We  were  paid  five- 
pence  an  hour  for  a  seven-hour  day,  and  as 
funds  were  very  low  at  home  I  should  have 
been  glad  of  the  money.  For  the  same  reason  I 
could  not  pay  for  a  doctor;  so,  much  against 
the  grain,  I  had  to  send  for  the  parish  one.  I 
hope  he  does  n  't  treat  all  the  patients  he  is  paid 
out  of  the  rates  to  attend  to  with  the  same 
brusqueness.  Still,  I  suppose  that  when  a  man 
has  got  so  low  that  he  has  to  apply  for  medical 
relief  it  does  n't  much  matter  whether  he  recovers 
or  not.  Probably  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten  it  would 
be  better  for  him  if  he  didn't.  I  hope  I 
may  not  injure  him  with  his  employers,  the  Board 
of  Guardians,  if  I  say  I  found  the  relieving 
officer  who  came  to  see  me  more  humane  and 
considerate. 

I  began  to  get  about  again  towards  the  end 
of  the  week,  and  was  engaged  during  the  next 
week  or  two  upon  this  story.  Then  another 
post-card  arrived,  telling  me  to  report  myself  for 


TRYING  TO  CLIMB  269 

work  on  the  King's  Drive.  This  is  a  splendid 
new  road  the  Council  have  built,  connecting 
Eastbourne  with  Hampden  Park,  and  this  winter 
they  have  been  carrying  out  its  surface  drainage 
with  unemployed  labour.  I  had  been  told  that 
the  work  was  harder  than  that  on  the  Crumbles, 
but  though  I  had  tried  I  could  not  get  a  chair, 
so  I  was  very  glad  of  the  chance  to  get  the  work. 
It  was  real  navvy's  work,  and  I  wondered  how 
I  should  get  on  with  it. 

The  foreman  put  me  to  get  up  the  trench 
with  pick  and  shovel  at  first,  then  seeing,  I  sup- 
pose, that  I  was  not  used  to  it,  he  gave  me  a 
job  as  "stage"  man:  that  is  to  say,  I  had  to 
stand  on  the  edge  of  the  trench  and  shovel  the 
debris  back  as  the  men  got  it  out,  keeping 
a  clear  space  for  three  workers  below.  We 
worked  on  Thursday  and  Friday  in  a  bleak 
wind  with  a  good  deal  of  snow  in  it,  eight  hours 
instead  of  seven,  but  I  found  it  did  not  tire  me 
nearly  as  much  as  the  clay.  The  materials  of 
which  the  road  was  made  up  were  not  so  heavy. 
I  had  a  good  shovel,  which  I  could  easily  keep 
clean  and,  by  adopting  a  methodical  way  of 
working,  I  kept  my  end  up  pretty  well.  Still,  it 
was  tiring,  and  the  sound  of  the  foreman's 
whistle,  telling  us  to  knock  off  for  lunch  or 
dinner  or  at  five  o'clock  for  the  day,  was 
welcome. 

On  the  Saturday  the  ground  was  covered  with 


270  GEORGE  MEEK 

snow,  and  we  were  all  set  to  work  clearing  the 
pavements.  This  was  a  change,  but  it  was 
harder  work  on  account  of  the  weight  of  the 
brooms  used,  and  much  to  my  disgust  I  found 
myself  on  Sunday  morning  unable  to  move  with 
the  old  pain  in  my  side.  It  was  the  same  on 
Monday.  This  made  me  angry,  because  not 
only  did  it  make  me  appear  foolish  and  in- 
capable, but  it  did  me  out  of  a  week's  work — 
and  nineteen  shillings  in  wages.  I  got  up  on 
the  Thursday  morning  determined  that  I  would 
work;  but  I  proposed,  my  muscular  rheuma- 
tism, pleurisy  or  whatever  it  is,  disposed.  I 
soaked  myself  in  spirits  of  turpentine  till  I  smelt 
horribly,  but  I  did  not  send  for  that  parish 
doctor  again.  I  was  very  sorry  about  this  last 
breakdown;  I  did  not  dislike  my  work  as  "stage 
man"  nor  the  foreman,  nor  did  I  mind  the  snow 
sweeping,  but  even  I  cannot  do  impossibilities, 
and  it  is  impossible  to  do  hard,  heavy  work 
which  necessitates  constant  movement  when 
your  side  feels  as  though  it  was  in  an  iron  vice 
and  every  cough  and  motion  sends  a  dart  through 
your  lungs. 

I  have  been  for  a  great  many  years  deeply 
interested  in  the  unemployed  problem,  but  this 
is  the  first  time  I  have  worked  amongst  them. 
Although  the  work  given  them  is  quite  unlike 
what  most  of  them  have  been  used  to,  there  are 
very  few  shirkers  amongst  them;  mostly  they 


TRYING  TO  CLIMB  271 

try  to  work  as  hard  as  they  can.  Many  of  them 
have  wives  and  large  families  dependent  upon 
them,  so  that  it  seems  absurd  to  employ  them 
for  about  one  week  in  four,  which  appears  to  be 
the  rule.  It  is  true  they  occasionally  receive 
tickets  for  coal  and  food  in  their  "off"  weeks 
from  the  Mayor's  Poor  Fund,  but  how  far  do 
these  go  towards  keeping  perhaps  four,  five  or 
more  persons?  One  of  our  councillors  has  per- 
sistently denied  that  there  is  any  distress  in 
Eastbourne.  He  has  always  moved  the  rejec- 
tion of  any  grant  in  aid  to  the  town  from  the 
funds  available  in  the  hands  of  the  Local 
Government  Board.  He  is  a  Tory  (I  always 
call  people  of  this  party  Tory,  everybody  knows 
what  I  mean,  and  they  change  the  name  they 
call  themselves  so  often).  I  do  not  know 
whether  he  is  a  married  man  or  not  (only  married 
men  are  employed  on  the  relief  works),  but  if 
he  is  I  should  like  him  to  be  unemployed  in  East- 
bourne just  one  winter  and  see  how  he  could 
live  and  support  those  dependent  on  him  on  one 
week's  wages  of  from  sixteen  to  nineteen  shil- 
lings in  four,  with  a  few  grocery  and  coal  tickets 
in  between! 

But,  of  course,  working  people,  especially  the 
poor  and  unemployed,  belong  to  a  different  race 
from  the  exalted  class  whose  interest  the  well-to- 
do  party  looks  after.  It  does  n't  matter  whether 
they  eat  or  starve,  live  or  die,  there  will  be 


272  GEORGE  MEEK 

always  plenty  left  to  exploit  for  the  rents  and 
profits  upon  which  the  "gentry"  live. 

I  trust  the  reports  of  the  Poor  Law  Commis- 
sion will  have  some  effect  in  bettering  things 
for  the  unemployed  before  long.  I  did  hope 
the  Labour  Party  would  have  done  something 
before  now,  but  most  of  its  leaders  appear  to  be 
more  concerned  in  taming  the  Party  which  sent 
them  to  Parliament  to  their  own  hands  than  in 
endeavouring  to  forward  the  interests  of  their 
supporters.  The  latest  news  is  that  Independ- 
ent Labour  Party  branches  are  not  allowed  to 
communicate  with  each  other  respecting  the 
resolutions  they  wish  to  submit  to  its  Annual 
Conference:  they  must  move  only  to  the  strings 
it  suits  J.  R.  Macdonald  to  pull.  The  workers, 
apparently,  so  far  as  politicians  of  every  shade 
care,  can  go  on  working  when  they  are  wanted 
for  a  bare  subsistence  wage,  and  when  their 
services  are  not  required  they  may  still  be  per- 
mitted to  slink  into  some  out-of-the-way  corner 
and  starve. 

The  whole  situation  makes  me  sick  at  heart 
and  weary.  We  preach  and  organize,  spend 
our  years  in  labouring  to  encourage  the  workers 
to  unite  together  to  bring  about  a  more  sane 
and  just  social  order,  to  lift  the  burdens  from 
their  shoulders  which  grind  them  into  the  dust, 
to  abolish  once  and  for  all  the  crying  shame  of 
the  willing  man  seeking  work  and  finding  none, 


TRYING  TO  CLIMB  273 

and  then  some  interested  jack-in-office  comes 
along  fostering  dissension  and  division  for  his 
own  personal  ends.  What  is  the  use  of  all  our 
devotion  and  sacrifice  when  any  specious  trickster 
can  undo  half  what  we  have  done?  While  there 
will  be  always  those  from  other  classes  who  will, 
from  very  nobility  of  soul,  devote  themselves 
to  the  cause  of  the  workers,  these  last  must  look 
to  themselves  for  their  own  salvation,  and  that 
will  never  come  until  they  stand  by  those,  whether 
of  their  own  class  or  not,  who  serve  them  from 
love  and  refuse  to  listen  to  those  who  wish  to 
mislead  and  exploit  them.  The  workers  can 
save  themselves  when  they  want  to — collectively. 
The  system  they  have  to  overthrow  is  a  ridiculous 
monstrosity;  one  good  heave  all  together  and  it 
would  disappear  'mid  a  storm  of  derision  and 
laughter. 

And  so  my  long  tale  draws  to  an  end.  It  has 
taken  a  long  while  to  write  and  revise:  I  have 
had  only  just  an  hour  or  two  a  day  to  give  to  it, 
as  since  February  1909  I  have  been  out  with  a 
chair  again. 

Our  work  has  grown  more  uncertain  than 
ever.  Many  weeks  I  earn  less  than  ten  shillings 
even  in  the  summer  time.  Besides,  since  my 
illness  last  autumn  I  have  never  been  quite  well. 
There  are  days  together  when  I  have  to  force 
myself  to  eat.  I  feel  weary  of  everything;  of 
the  long  struggle  which  never  seems  to  leave 


274  GEORGE  MEEK 

me  any  farther  ahead,  of  the  wretched  uncertain 
life,  and  the  never-ending  worry. 

I  have  written  of  my  wife's  work  as  an  ironer. 
That  used  to  help  us  considerably :  she  could  nearly 
always  earn  ten  shillings  a  week  and  over  up  to  this 
year.  But  now,  often,  she  can  get  no  work  at  all, 
and  when  she  gets  any  the  prices  paid  for  it  (she 
is  a  piece  worker)  are  so  small  that  she  seldom 
earns  more  than  eight  shillings,  even  for  a  full 
week.  In  two  of  the  laundries  she  has  tried  this 
year  the  prices  paid  were  very  low  and  the  women 
had  no  books  or  papers  to  show  the  amount  of  work 
they  did.  She  has  just  been  discharged  from  one 
of  these  places  because,  finding  they  had  cheated 
her  out  of  a  shilling,  by  keeping  an  account  of  the 
work  she  did  herself,  she  complained  of  it.  The 
owner  of  this  laundry  can  buy  houses :  his  workers 
must  find  it  difficult  to  buy  bread. 

How  we  shall  get  through  the  coming  winter 
I  don't  know.  Still,  somehow  we  seem  to  have 
kept  on  through  the  years  almost  as  by  a  miracle : 
always  on  the  edge  of  the  abyss,  never  quite  sink- 
ing into  it,  seldom  getting  far  away  from  the 
edge.  When  there  has  been  a  little  luck  of  any 
kind  it  has  usually  been  accompanied  by  some 
sickness  or  some  other  trouble  which  has  counter- 
balanced it. 

To  those  who  are  inclined  to  blame  me  for  my 
politics  I  ask,  can  you  show  me  any  better  way? 


TRYING  TO  CLIMB  275 

Christianity  in  various  forms  has  been  tried 
for  nearly  two  thousand  years,  and  has  failed. 
Liberalism  and  Conservatism  have  been  tried, 
and  they  have  failed.  So  far  as  the  workers 
are  concerned  the  attitude  of  Christians,  Liberals 
and  Conservatives,  as  such,  is  uncompromisingly 
hostile. 

Suppose  all  the  schemes  of  Social  Reform 
which  are  "in  the  air"  (and  likely  to  remain 
there  so  far  as  I  can  see)  are  adopted:  sup- 
posing the  hungry  school  children  are  fed, 
necessitous  mothers  are  endowed,  unemployed 
working  men  maintained,  all  the  aged  pensioned, 
all  the  sick  and  disabled  adequately  cared  for: 
what  will  you  have  then?  On  the  one  hand  still 
the  wealthy  exploiting  class,  on  the  other  a  class 
of  slaves  and  paupers.  Bread  would  be  assured, 
it  is  true,  but  is  bread  everything?  Is  there 
nothing  to  be  said  for  manhood? 

At  the  time  of  writing — nearly  six  months 
after  the  bulk  of  this  book  was  written — I  take 
little  part  and  little  interest  in  current  politics. 
I  am  weary  of  all  the  lying,  the  meanness  and 
trickery  it  involves.  I  just  bury  myself  in  the 
books  I  am  reading  (Browning,  ^Eschylus, 
Sophocles,  Euripides,  Virgil,  Lucretius)  and  the 
stories  I  am  trying  to  write.  Some  day,  per- 
haps, justice  will  come  by  her  own:  men  will  learn 
to  live  natural  and  honourable  lives. 

But  until  the  conscience  of  humanity  has  so 


276  GEORGE  MEEK 

developed  that  men  will  no  more  think  of  ex- 
ploiting their  fellow-men  than  they  now  think, 
in  civilized  lands  at  least,  of  buying  and  selling 
them  in  the  slave-market,  there  will  always  be 
such  wasted  lives  as  mine.  And  most  men, 
living  as  they  do  under  unjust,  unnatural,  un- 
healthy conditions,  do  live  wasted  lives. 


EPILOGUE 

IN  the  foregoing  pages  it  has  been  my  painful 
duty  to  record  many  unpleasant  things.  I  was 
bound  by  the  terms  of  my  agreement  with  Mr. 
Wells  to  be  truthful,  and  I  could  not  write  smooth 
things  and  at  the  same  time  fulfil  my  agreement. 
But  now  in  these  last  few  pages  I  have  to  tell  of 
brighter  days.  Easier,  more  peaceful  days  already 
experienced,  and  still  brighter  ones  in  view. 

After  I  had  finished  the  revision  of  the  last 
chapter  and  sent  this  work  to  Messrs.  Constable, 
things  grew  from  bad  to  worse.  The  chair  work 
was  irregular  and  unsatisfactory  owing  to  the 
keen  competition  and  the  unsettled  weather.  My 
poor  wife  walked  from  laundry  to  laundry,  but 
could  not  get  a  start.  The  person  who  owned 
the  chair  I  hired  worried  me  daily  for  his  rent, 
and  as  I  seldom  earned  ten  shillings  a  week  I 
could  not  pay  him  much. 

I  suppose  as  I  am  now  strong  I  ought  to  be 
merciful.  I  am,  as  a  rule,  forgiving;  but  I  find 
it  hard  to  forgive,  or  at  least  to  forget,  this  man. 
He  made  my  life  such  a  burden  to  me  this  summer. 
He  had  four  bathchairs.  One  was  let  to  a 

277 


278  GEORGE  MEEK 

butcher  who  had  been  frozen  out  of  his  calling 
by  the  frozen  meat  industry.  One  was  let  to  an 
elderly  man  who  had  been  a  groom  at  one  time 
in  the  service  of  Lord  Middleton — the  inventor 
of  the  "Brodrick"  cap.  One  had  formerly  been 
a  guard  on  one  of  the  northern  railways — I  think 
the  North-Eastern.  The  fourth  was  my  un- 
fortunate self.  Nearly  every  day  the  chair- 
owner  would  come  worrying  us,  sometimes  on  his 
bicycle,  sometimes  walking,  but  always  an  object 
of  laughter  to  the  other  men  because  he  dressed  in 
a  dark  cycling  suit  with  loud  golf  stockings,  and 
carried  a  leather  bag  in  his  hand — they  presumed 
to  hold  our  rents. 

At  home  things  were  far  from  being  peaceful 
or  pleasant.  We  occupied  a  three-roomed  flat. 
The  windows  of  the  front  room  had  been  broken 
by  boys  playing  football  in  the  street,  and  never 
repaired.  The  flat  beneath  us — we  occupied  the 
second  floor — was  let  to  a  hawker  who  had  five 
children.  Some  of  these  were  crying  most  of 
the  time,  all  of  them  some  of  the  time;  I  never 
met  with  such  children  for  weeping  and  wailing. 
I  could  not  write  a  line  for  them.  At  night  we 
were  frequently  awakened  from  our  "beauty" 
sleep  by  drunken  brawls,  sometimes  in  the  house, 
sometimes  outside.  Altogether,  what  with  the 
worry  of  "Stockings,"  or  "Knickerbockers"  (as 
the  chair-owner  was  called),  and  the  want  of  rest 
and  quiet  at  home,  I  was  getting  dangerously 


EPILOGUE  279 

near  qualifying  for  a  place  at  Hellingly.  In  fact, 
if  I  had  n't  had  an  occasional  deep  drink  I  have 
no  doubt  but  that  I  should  have  been  there  before 
now. 

Things  grew  from  worse  to  worse  still.  "Knick- 
erbockers" threatened  to  stop  the  chair  daily. 
I  could  not  get  a  decent  job.  Often  we  had  no 
dinner  on  week  days,  and  just  bread  and  cheese 
or  ready-cooked  bacon  and  bread  on  Sundays; 
to  buy  which  I  had  to  go  out  on  Sunday  mornings 
and  earn  the  money.  Clothes,  boots,  bed-clothes 
were  in  pawn,  money  borrowed  on  many  of  the 
tickets.  In  all  our  experience  we  never  found 
things  so  difficult. 

Then  a  change  came.  It  is  curious,  but  I  kept 
thinking,  as  things  grew  worse  and  worse,  "'Tis 
darkest  just  before  the  dawn."  Perhaps  people 
always  think  that,  when  troubles  accumulate, 
whether  there  is  any  relief  in  store  for  them  or 
not;  but  certainly  this  thought  was  often  in  my 
mind  as  I  pondered  over  one  thing  and  another. 

One  day  I  had  had  no  work  in  the  morning. 
In  the  afternoon  it  was  very  cold.  I  put  my  chair 
away  early — my  overcoat  was  in  pawn — and  went 
to  the  Free  Library,  where  I  entered  my  name 
as  being  unemployed — which  I  was  most  of  the 
time — hoping  to  be  put  on  the  relief  work  again. 
I  expected  to  lose  the  chair  every  day.  Having 
filled  up  the  form  provided,  I  sat  at  a  side  table 
for  some  time  looking  over  guides  to  Victoria 


280  GEORGE  MEEK 

and  other  parts  of  British  Columbia,  wishing 
myself  out  there,  where  many  members  of  my 
family  have  done  well. 

That  night  we  had  no  money  and  nothing  to 
eat.  I  tried  to  sell  some  books,  but  could  get 
no  one  to  buy  them.  The  next  morning  was 
fine,  and  I  took  the  books  out  with  me  to  try  to 
sell  them  again;  failing,  I  left  them  in  the  coach- 
house and  went  out  with  the  chair.  I  managed 
to  get  an  hour  early,  which  provided  us  with 
dinner  and  something  for  tea.  Wishing  to  avoid 
"Knickerbockers,"  and  hoping  to  earn  some- 
thing to  give  him  in  the  afternoon,  I  took  the 
chair  up  towards  the  Grand  Hotel.  I  had  been 
in  the  habit  of  standing  near  the  railway  station 
in  Gildredge  Road. 

Before  I  went  home  to  dinner  a  fellow  chair- 
man named  West  told  me  that  a  stranger  had 
been  inquiring  for  me.  He  said  that  he  looked 
like  a  working-man,  so  I  concluded  that  it  was 
either  some  one  to  whom  I  owed  some  money  or 
a  Socialist  from  away. 

After  dinner  I  found  that  this  stranger  had 
been  inquiring  for  me  of  other  chair-men.  I 
began  to  get  interested  and  anxious,  as  I  under- 
stood he  had  gone  up  to  my  chair  on  the  parade 
to  wait  for  me.  So  I  hurried  up  to  it,  acquiring 
three  halfpence-worth  of  Dutch  courage  at  the 
Devonshire  Park  Restaurant  en  passant.  When 
I  reached  the  chair  I  found  a  tall,  well-built 


EPILOGUE  281 

elderly  man  sitting  near  it  talking  to  a  fellow 
chair-man  with  whom  I  have  always  been  friendly, 
named  Piper. 

"Mick,"  he  said,  "here  is  a  gentleman  wants 
to  see  you." 

("Mick,"  or  "Mickie,"  corruptions  of  my  sur- 
name, are  what  I  am  usually  called  by  the  other 
bathchair-men . ) 

"You  don't  know  me,  I  suppose,"  the  stranger 
said  to  me. 

"No,  I  can't  say  that  I  do,"  I  replied. 

"Well,  I  'm  a  Meek,"  he  said. 

"Oh!"  I  replied.  "From  New  Zealand?" 
I  could  see  it  was  not  my  father's  brother  John, 
whose  photograph  I  have  had  for  some  years. 
He  used  to  pride  himself  upon  his  resemblance 
to  Lord  Roberts,  and,  of  course,  had  a  grey 
moustache.  This  man  did  not  resemble  Lord 
Roberts  in  the  least.  (I  have  seen  and  spoken  to 
"Bobs,"  so  I  know.)  For  one  thing  he  was  tall 
and  broad-shouldered,  and  though  he  had  a  heavy 
moustache,  it  was  not  grey. 

"No,"  he  answered,  "from  Vancouver." 

"Not  Dick?"  I  exclaimed. 

"Yes,"  he  said,  "I'm  Dick." 

"Well,  I'm  d d!"  I  exclaimed.  I  hope 

my  readers  will  forgive  me,  but  I  was  completely 
surprised.  I  had  not  heard  from  my  uncle  Dick, 
my  father's  youngest  brother,  for  over  ten  years, 
and  he  was  about  the  last  man  I  ever  expected 


282  GEORGE  MEEK 

to  see  in  England.  It  seems  he  had  been  staying 
at  Hastings  with  a  cousin  of  his  for  some  time, 
purposing  to  look  me  up,  but  unable  to  com- 
municate with  me  because  he  did  not  know  my 
address.  We  sat  talking  for  half-an-hour,  I 
explaining  how  I  was  living,  and  telling  him  of 
my  hopes  (then  growing  very  slender)  from  this 
book:  he  telling  me  of  his  life  in  British  Colum- 
bia, and,  while  he  did  not  lead  me  to  think  he 
was  very  well  off  himself,  painting  the  life  of 
working-people  there  in  the  most  glowing  colours. 

While  we  sat  there  "Knickerbockers"  came 
up  and  called  me  on  one  side. 

"Have  you  any  money  for  me?"  he  asked. 

"No,"  I  answered,  "I  have  only  earned  2s.  6d. 
this  week." 

(This  happened  on   a   Thursday — Nov.   4th.) 

"Very  well,"  he  said,  "you  take  the  chair 
home  and  hand  me  over  the  key  of  the  coach- 
house." 

"All  right,"  I  answered.  I  was  not  surprised, 
and,  to  tell  the  truth,  I  did  n't  much  care. 

"And  look  here,"  he  said,  "you  will  lose  your 
licence  in  a  day  or  two." 

"That  won't  be  a  great  loss,"  I  retorted,  and 
turning  my  back  upon  him  I  asked  my  uncle  if 
he  would  walk  down  with  me  to  the  coach-house. 
On  the  way  I  told  him  what  had  happened,  but  I 
neither  asked  him  to  help  me  out  of  my  trouble 
nor  did  I  expect  him  to.  He  asked  me  if  I  could 


EPILOGUE  283 

get  a  decent  living  if  I  had  a  chair  of  my  own, 
but  I  told  him  that  of  late  years  the  work  had 
declined  so  much  it  was  not  worth  troubling 
about.  I  tried  to  put  the  best  face  I  could  on 
it  by  explaining  that  I  hoped  to  be  put  on  the 
Corporation  Relief  Works.  If  I  had  but  known, 
this  uncle  of  mine,  though  he  was  not  too  well 
dressed,  and  certainly  wore  neither  a  knicker- 
bocker  suit  nor  golf  stockings,  could  have  bought 
me  half-a-dozen  chairs — if  I  had  wanted  them 
and  he  had  cared  to. 

We  walked  down  to  the  coach-house,  where  I 
put  the  chair  away  and  handed  over  the  key  in 
silence  to  its  owner.  From  there  we  went  to  the 
"Rose  and  Crown,"  where  we  had  a  drink,  for 
which  my  uncle  would  not  let  me  pay.  Instead, 
he  showed  me  some  plaster  work  over  the  boot- 
maker's shop  opposite  which  he  had  done  him- 
self some  forty  years  before.  And  on  the  way 
home  he  showed  me  the  house  in  East  Street 
in  which  I  was  born  and  where  he  had  last  seen 
me. 

When  we  reached  home  my  little  daughter, 
who  had  been  in  bed  all  day  with  the  toothache, 
fell  in  love  with  him,  and  he  with  her.  We  had 
tea,  he  telling  us  of  his  early  life  in  England,  when 
I  found  I  had  many  connections,  aunts  and 
cousins,  of  whom  I  had  never  heard  before,  here 
and  at  Hastings.  When  we  got  up  from  the 
table  to  go  out  my  uncle  said — 


284  GEORGE  MEEK 

"I  have  a  little  present  for  you.  Which  shall 
I  give  it  to?" 

"You'd  better  give  it  to  Kate,"  I  answered. 
He  put  something  into  my  wife's  hand,  which 
made  her  face  light  up  and  her  eyes  shine.  I 
thought  it  was  five,  or  perhaps  ten,  shillings.  It 
was  a  sovereign. 

We  went  for  a  walk  together,  then  return- 
ing home  my  wife  came  out  with  us  to  accom- 
pany my  uncle  to  the  station.  As  we  had  plenty 
of  time  we  took  a  walk  round.  Incidentally 
we  called  at  "The  Eagle"  for  drinks,  and  my 
uncle  told  the  landlord  that  he  used  to  frequent 
the  selfsame  tavern  nearly  forty  years  before 
when  he  was  helping  to  build  St.  Saviour's  Church 
steeple.  "We  used  to  call  it,"  he  said,  "'wetting 
the  Eagle's  wings.'"  "We,"  I  said,  "have  a 
shorter  term  for  it.  We  call  it  'feeding  the  bird.' " 
"The  Eagle"  is  one  of  the  cleanest  and  best 
conducted  houses  in  the  town. 

He  went  away  to  Hastings,  promising  to  write 
to  us.  He  had  said — I  thought  only  in  fun — that 
he  wanted  Milly  to  go  back  to  Vancouver  with 
him.  We  were  to  follow,  I  understood,  as  soon 
as  the  returns  from  this  work  would  enable  us 
to  pay  our  passages  out.  The  next  day  I  paid 
the  chair-owner  four  shillings,  and  he  let  me 
have  the  chair  again  on  the  understanding  that 
I  should  pay  him  another  four  on  the  following 
Monday  morning.  During  the  next  three  days 


EPILOGUE  285 

I  only  earned  four  shillings,  so  I  went  to  his 
office  to  tell  him  I  could  not  pay  him  then,  but 
as  I  knew  I  should  have  ten  shillings  on  the 
Tuesday,  I  would  pay  him  then.  He  refused 
to  wait  another  day,  so  I  handed  him  over  the 
key. 

So  we  were  both  out  of  work  again.  I  had 
sent  this  book  some  time  before  to  its  publishers, 
and  slender  as  my  hopes  of  its  success  were,  they 
began  to  grow  from  the  fact  that  it  had  not 
been  returned.  So  I  wrote  to  Messrs.  Constable 
and  Mr.  Wells  asking  whether  anything  was 
being  arranged.  My  uncle  had  sent  us  a  post- 
card asking  if  we  were  getting  the  girl  ready  to 
go  back  with  him. 

On  the  Tuesday  I  had  the  ten  shillings  I  expected. 
On  the  Wednesday  I  heard  that  the  book  was  to 
be  published.  On  the  Thursday  my  uncle  came 
to  see  us  again.  This  time  he  gave  us  two  pounds, 
and  definitely  arranged  to  take  Milly  back  with 
him.  I  did  not  know  then  upon  what  terms  my 
book  would  be  published,  and  we  thought  it 
better  for  her  to  go  than  to  stay  with  us  and  face 
the  hardships  we  expected  this  winter.  He  offered 
to  take  my  wife  as  well,  but  she  did  not  like  the 
idea  of  leaving  me  behind  alone.  If  I  could  have 
raised  twenty  pounds,  he  said,  he  could  have  taken 
us  all!  And  had  he  known  a  month  earlier  how 
we  were  situated,  he  would  have  sent  home  for  the 
money. 


286  GEORGE  MEEK 

A  good  part  of  the  two  pounds  was  spent  upon 
things  for  the  journey  we  expected  Milly  to  have 
to  take;  but  on  the  following  Tuesday  I  found 
that  I  should  have  an  ample  allowance  during 
the  winter  months  to  enable  me  to  finish  this 
work  and  correct  the  proofs.  We  decided,  there- 
fore, that  it  would  be  better  for  Milly  to  stay 
and  go  out  with  us  in  the  spring.  So  I  went  to 
Hastings  in  the  afternoon  and  communicated 
this  good  news  to  my  uncle,  who,  while  I  think 
he  regretted  the  little  one  was  not  going  back  with 
him,  admitted  that  it  would  be  best.  He  arranged 
to  send  passes  for  all  of  us  as  soon  as  he  got  home 
and  could  get  one  of  his  houses  ready  for  us  to  go 
into  when  we  got  there. 

I  do  not  know  even  now  exactly  how  he  is 
situated.  He  told  us  that  he  had  worked  a  great 
many  years,  a  great  part  of  the  time  in  the  con- 
struction of  the  Canadian  Pacific  Railway,  and 
that  while  he  had  not  been  compelled  to  deny 
himself,  he  had  been  able,  by  avoiding  reckless 
waste,  and  by  judiciously  investing  his  savings 
in  real  estate  in  the  vicinity  of  Vancouver  City, 
to  acquire  sufficient  to  live  upon  comfortably 
without  any  longer  being  compelled  to  work.  He 
assured  me  I  should  find  no  difficulty  in  obtaining 
suitable  employment  out  there.  "And,"  he  said, 
"if  you  don't  you  will  never  want  while  I  live." 

It  had  been  arranged  that  I  should  meet  Mr. 
Wells  and  Mr.  T.  Seccombe — a  member  of  the 


EPILOGUE  287 

firm  of  publishers  who  are  responsible  for  this 
book — at  Spiers  and  Pond's  Central  Restaurant 
on  the  Wednesday  to  discuss  details.  As  it 
happened  my  uncle  was  leaving  for  Liverpool 
on  the  same  date,  so  I  joined  him  at  Polegate 
and  we  travelled  up  together,  my  wife  and  Milly 
going  to  Polegate  with  me  to  bid  him  au  revoir. 
Arrived  at  London  Bridge  we  made  our  way 
through  the  throngs  waiting  to  see  the  Kings  of 
England  and  Portugal  pass  through  the  City  to 
Ludgate  Circus.  Here  we  found  Mr.  Seccombe, 
but  my  uncle  could  not  wait  to  see  Mr.  Wells, 
who  was  a  few  minutes  late,  as  he  was  anxious 
to  get  on  to  Euston.  I  was  sorry  Mr.  Wells  missed 
this  typical  pioneer  of  Empire. 

We  had  an  exceedingly  plain  but  substantial 
and  enjoyable  lunch,  which  occupied  us  two 
hours.  I  had  no  thought  for  the  crowds  of 
people  lunching  around  us.  So  much  had  hap- 
pened in  so  short  a  time,  and  there  were  these 
two  gentlemen  talking,  talking,  and  I  did  not 
wish  to  miss  a  word.  Something  seemed  to 
have  made  Mr.  Wells  particularly  happy — 
although  he  chaffed  Mr.  Seccombe  unmercifully 
in  his  rdle  as  publisher,  he  beamed  on  both  of 
us.  We  had  lager  beer  in  pint  jugs,  roast  beef 
and  potatoes,  apple  tart  with  cream,  and  cheese. 
Then  my  two  hosts  tossed  to  see  who  was  to 
pay.  Mr.  Wells  won,  but  insisted  on  paying. 
He  said  a  new  rule  had  been  introduced,  by  which 


288  GEORGE  MEEK 

the  winner  instead  of  the  loser  paid;  so  Mr. 
Seccombe  insisted  upon  another  toss. 

Then  Mr.  Wells  had  to  leave  us  to  keep  an 
appointment.  Mr.  Seccombe  took  me  along 
Fleet  Street  in  search  of  the  Outer  Temple, 
where  he  wished  to  see  Mr.  F.  J.  Green,  the 
secretary  of  the  International  Arbitration  Society 
and  Socialist  Candidate  for  Bristol.  Though  Mr. 
Walter  Jerrold,  a  grandson  of  the  author  of  Mrs. 
Caudle's  Curtain  Lectures,  directed  us,  we  found 
some  difficulty  in  finding  this  place,  and  when 
we  did  we  had  so  many  stairs  to  climb  I  thought 
they  would  never  end.  Afterwards,  tea  in  a  Fleet 
Street  shop,  where  in  discussing  the  events  of  the 
past  few  weeks  they  sounded  so  much  like  the 
conventional  ending  to  a  conventional  story  that 
Mr.  Seccombe  agreed  with  me  in  thinking  my 
readers  would  consider  them  too  strange  to  be 
true. 

But  all  I  have  narrated  in  this  epilogue,  as 
all  I  have  written  in  this  book,  is  true.  It  is, 
the  whole  of  it,  a  true  story,  told  as  plainly  and 
simply  as  I  could  find  English  to  tell  it  in.  Here 
I  am  sitting  in  a  decent  quiet  house,  with  every 
necessary  provided  for,  with  no  worry,  and  the 
prospect  of  a  hopeful  and  useful  future. 

Mr.  Seccombe  had  to  deliver  a  lecture  at  an 
institution  near  Chancery  Lane.  He  invited  me 
to  attend  it,  but  I  felt  a  burning  desire  to  get 
away  by  myself  and  think;  besides,  I  was  anxious 


EPILOGUE  289 

to  get  away  home  as  quickly  as  possible.  On 
parting,  Mr.  Wells  had  said — 

"Now  I  suppose  you  will  enjoy  yourself  in 
town  to-night?" 

"No,"  I  answered;  "I  shall  jolly  well  get  out 
of  it  as  quick  as  I  can." 

I  had  become  unfamiliar  with  London  and  its 
ways  after  having  been  away  from  it  so  long,  and 
I  found  some  difficulty  in  making  my  way  back 
to  London  Bridge.  It  was  over  twenty  minutes 
before  I  dared  venture  across  Blackfriars  Road: 
there  was  a  slight  drizzle,  the  streets  were  wet, 
and  I  was  nervous.  However,  I  managed  it  at 
last,  in  time  to  catch  one  of  the  slowest  of  the 
Brighton  Company's  slow  trains. 

I  have  since  arranged  with  my  landlord  to 
let  me  have  a  quieter  house  to  work  in.  I  have 
hired  another  chair  for  a  month,  as  I  did  not 
wish  to  spend  all  my  time  over  the  fire,  but  I 
should  have  been  wiser  had  I  kept  the  money  in 
my  pocket;  a  fortnight  of  the  month  has  elapsed 
and  I  have  had  only  one  job  with  it.  I  am  not 
hiring  any  more  bathchairs  or  paying  any  more 
chair-rent  —  if  I  can  help  it.  "Enough,"  the 
late  E.  F.  Fay  used  to  say,  "is  almost  as  good 
as  a  feast."  I  have  had  enough  bathchair  work 
to  last  me  all  this  life,  and  if  there  is  any  truth 
in  the  Pythagorean  theory,  through  half-a-dozen 
more.  I  have  every  reason  to  believe  that 
I  never  need  know  want  again  such  as  I  have 


290  GEORGE  MEEK 

known  in  the  past.  Just  as  it  seemed  that  I,  and 
those  dependent  upon  me,  were  about  to  sink 
once  for  all,  there  were  hands  stretched  out  will- 
ing and  anxious  to  help  us;  first  those  of  my 
unexpected,  unthought-of  uncle,  then  Mr.  Wells 
and  my  publishers.  Just  as  the  scene  had  reached 
its  very  blackest  and  for  us  all  to  go  to  the  work- 
house seemed  only  a  matter  of  days,  ways  opened 
and  all  became  light. 

Time  alone  can  prove  whether  or  not  I  can 
succeed  as  a  writer  of  fiction  or  an  essayist.  I 
am  content  to  wait  its  verdict.  But  I  do,  in  any 
case,  look  forward  with  the  pleasantest  anticipa- 
tions to  our  journey  to  the  Sunny  West,  to  the 
ride  through  the  glorious  Rockies,  and  the  home 
awaiting  us,  where  hopeless,  abject  poverty  such 
as  surrounds  us  here  is,  as  yet,  unknown,  to  the 
near  kindred  I  have  not  seen  for  so  many  years 
and  whom  I  have  longed  to  see. 

I  have  not  lost  my  licence  as  a  bathchair-man 
— my  nineteenth  consecutive  one — though  it  is 
no  longer  of  much  value  to  me,  so  that  "Stock- 
ings" has  proved  a  false  prophet.  I  am  afraid 
that  if  I  suggested  any  means  by  which  the  lot  of 
the  poor  bathchair-man  could  be  lightened,  those 
responsible  would  not  listen  to  me.  "No  prophet 
is  without  honour  save  in  his  own  country." 
Here,  however,  are  a  few  suggestions. 

Having  limited  the  number  of  licensed  chairs, 


EPILOGUE  291 

and  thus  given  them  a  monopoly  value,  the 
Watch  Committee  have  no  right  to  license  an 
unlimited  number  of  men.  By  doing  so  they 
place  them  entirely  in  the  power  of  the  chair- 
owners,  who,  though  they  know  very  well  that 
there  is  not  half  the  money  to  be  earned  with 
them  that  there  used  to  be,  and  that  the  men 
cannot  possibly  pay  their  rent  and  live,  still 
charge  the  same  rent  they  did  fourteen  or  fifteen 
years  ago.  Supposing  some  of  the  men  do  drink: 
I  doubt  if  any  self-respecting  man  could  feel 
himself  in  the  clutches  of  some  of  these  merciless 
bloodsuckers  without  taking  to  drink  or  going 
mad. 

The  chairs  are  necessary  in  a  town  like  East- 
bourne. They  are  a  useful  public  service,  and 
the  town  would  be  less  prosperous  without  them. 
It  is  not  to  the  interest  of  any  community  that 
any  of  its  useful  workers  should  live  unhealthy 
lives,  and  men  who  live  in  continuous  worry  and 
want  cannot  live  healthy  ones.  Bathchairs  will 
always  be  needed — till  we  get  aerial  ones;  but 
thank  goodness  I  Ve  done  with  them! 


THE    END 


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